Super Soup

The inevitable has happened. Just as I’m getting ready for my flu jab on Friday, the wrath of the common cold appears. My miraculous survival in various close quarters, areas of recycled ventilation, and gender-neutral common toilets at Chandler House (hooray gender neutrality! Booooo high-contact germy surfaces!) thus far without germies is at an end. Luckily, I’ve retained most of my mental capacity, but am incredibly happy that I don’t have any more work that must be done at my university today and that classes start late tomorrow. I can have some respite. And read a crapload about syntax, pragmatics, phonetics and phonology. In bed.

In the hope of staving off a total flu and cutting this cold off at the beginning, I made a super soup. It is packed with things to kill off the virus and to support me getting well.

Super Soup

Leftover bones (any kind. for this soup i used pork bones)

Around five cups of water (and more if needed) 

Four small mushrooms, chopped

Two small potatoes, sliced

1 cup of chopped carrot

Eight garlic cloves, crushed

1/2 a red onion, chopped (white or yellow are fine) 

1 cup of spinach

1 teaspoon of tumeric

1 teaspoon of Sea salt

1 free range egg

1/2 can of chickpeas

Juice of one lemon  

1) Boil the soup bones in the water for at least 30 minutes. Stir occasionally. 2) Open the chickpeas and drain off the liquid. Set aside. 3) Slice the potatoes and add them to the pot. Boil for five minutes or so. 4) Chop the mushrooms, onions, and carrots. Crush and peel the garlic. Add all these to the pot and boil for ten minutes or so. If the soup is getting low on liquid, add more water. 5) Stir in the salt and turmeric. Taste for seasoning. 6) Add at least one handful of spinach and stir it in. Don’t overcook it. 7) When the potatoes and carrots are soft, crack the egg directly into the pot and stir. Turn off the heat. 8) Squeeze the lemon into the soup, and serve. 

Makes about two servings. 

Soups are a marvellous invention of human cooking. They are essentially a suspension of nutrients in water, easily digested and absorbed. When I have a cold I go into fluids overdrive and suck down litres of water, juice, and tea. Soup is warm fluid food. Perfect for my poorly self.

It’s cheap, too! A lot of things that are probably lying about the house can be thrown into a pot and made into a delicious and nourishing soup. The recipe is only a guideline. It can be made with just water and no egg if you wanted to keep things vegan, or with vegetable stock. Nothing makes a better broth than soup bones, though. What are soup bones?

Whenever I cook something with bones in it like chicken or lamb, I secret away the remains of bones and fatty bits that people didn’t want to eat. These soup bones are from Monday’s pork chops. From four people’s plates. That sounds a little gross. But I assure you that there is no substitute for a good bone broth in terms of taste and nutrition, and this practice helps to cut down on food waste. Not to mention that the broth-making process involves boiling the bones in water for at least thirty minutes (and usually more like an hour) which is more than enough time to kill off any germs left on them. I use my soup bones more than once, and freeze them in between.

It becomes like a game to get the most nourishment and calories out of the bones. I win if I get more than one meal from the same ingredients.

May this soup make me healthy and strong! Stay healthy this autumn!

How do you treat yourself when you get a cold? Do you ever recycle ingredients? Tell me below!