Mrs Lawman's Super Soup! (Y3)
In Y3, Mrs Lawman has taught her class to make a home-made vegetable soup. This is a plant-based, vegetarian soup that is cooked on the hob and is ready in about 20-30 minutes. It is vegetarian, vegan and gluten free, low cost in terms of both ingredients and energy requirements, and made of cheap and seasonal fresh produce. It is high in fibre, low in fat and can be easily adapted for a very wide range of vegetables - whatever is cheapest in the shop or from the farm (or if you grow your own veg!).
The skills that Y3 have used included basic hygiene and food safety, chopping and peeling (with supervision) and starting to use the hob (again with supervision). They have also evaluated a range of ingredients using sensory vocabulary (it not just "nice" or "disgusting" but "sweet", "sour", "spicy" etc), as well as the final product. They have innovated the basic initial recipe to design and then made their own seasonal soup.
The soup is freezable so make a big batch and freeze other portions. Just cool to room temperature before freezing. Then defrost thoroughly and reheat in a microwave or on the stove top, making sure its piping hot.
This unit links to Y3 RE unit on Harvest and the Science topic on Healthy Diet.
Recipe (with grateful thanks to Jamie Oliver)
Ingredients
- 2 carrots
- 2 sticks of celery
- 2 medium onions
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 400 g leeks
- 400 g potatoes
- olive oil
- 2 organic chicken or vegetable stock cubes (check for gluten in ingredient list)
Method
- Trim, peel and roughly slice the carrots and celery. Peel and roughly chop the onions. Peel and finely slice the garlic.
- Cut the ends off the leeks, quarter them lengthways, wash them under running water and cut them into 1cm slices.
- Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a large pan on a high heat, add all the chopped and sliced ingredients and cook with the lid ajar for 10 minutes, or until softened, stirring regularly.
- Meanwhile, peel the potatoes and cut them into 1cm cubes.
- Put the stock cubes into a jug or pan, pour in 1.8 litres of boiling water and stir to dissolve, then pour into the veg pan.
- Add the potatoes. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to low and simmer for 10 minutes with the lid on, then remove from the heat.
- Season to taste with sea salt and black pepper, then either serve like this or pulse until smooth using a stick blender or liquidizer.
Tips
Soup doesn't have to be boring or predictable, jazz it up a bit! Try grilling, toasting or baking chunky croutons or slices of ciabatta bread to serve alongside, or tear in soft herbs at the last minute for an added flavour boost.
