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Cooking with Raymond

Vegetable soup

A truly wholesome and wonderfully delicious peasant soup. It combines all the fresh vegetables in a flavoursome broth providing many valuable nutrients.

Name of dish: Maman Blanc's soup
Preparation time: 30 mins
Cooking time: 15 mins
Serves: 2 people
Maman Blanc's vegetable soup

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Raymond makes Maman Blanc's soup and in passing explains the French paradox.

Ingredients

  • 30g/2tbsp Olive oil (Chef's note 1)
  • 50g/½ small onion, chopped finely
  • 40g/½ medium carrot, peeled and chopped finely
  • 25g/½ stick celery, peeled and chopped finely
  • 25g/¼ fennel, chopped finely
  • 400ml water, boiling
  • 25g peas, fresh
  • 25g/½ courgette, finely diced
  • 100g fresh cooked coco beans (Chef's note 2)
  • 100g/1 tomato, vine ripened, diced
  • 5g/5 pinches sea salt
  • ½g/1 pinch freshly ground white pepper

Method

  1. In a large pan sweat the vegetables (Chef's note 3) except the peas, courgette and tomatoes in the olive oil, for 4 minutes.
  2. Add the boiling water (Chef's note 4), season with salt and pepper, and simmer for 8 minutes.
  3. At the last moment, add the peas, courgette and the cooked beans and cook for a further 1 minute.
  4. Add the tomatoes, taste and correct seasoning if necessary.

Chef's notes

  1. When you cook olive oil, most of the molecules of flavours go away, so use a good but inexpensive oil. Only use extra virgin olive oil for dressings or added at the last moment to finish your dish.
  2. This variety of bean has a wonderful texture but can be replaced by haricot blanc beans, flageolet, butter beans or borlotti beans.
  3. The sweating process will bring the sugar out of the vegetables and enhance the flavour of the soup.
  4. I use boiling water to shorten the cooking time preserve the vivid colours, nutrients, clear flavours and textures of this soup.

The Menu

Raymond Blanc

A recipe for success

Raymond makes roast loin of pork stuffed with prunes.

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