You can't call yourself a proper blog if you don't have a recipe or two in your archives. So here is Garden65's:
Broad Bean and Bacon Soup
Ingredients
Bacon - from fridge
Onion - from allotment
Garlic - from allotment
Olive Oil - from cupboard
Courgettes - from allotment
Celery (about 4 inches worth) - from bottom of fridge
Vegetable Stock - from the other cupboard
Broad Beans - from allotment
Pepper - from the far end of the work surface, next to the salt
Cut bacon with scissors into little bits. Start to fry in saucepan, then bung in chopped onion, garlic and celery with a dollop of oil to stop it all sticking to the bottom. Wait for onion and celery to soften and the fat on the bacon to disappear (and the garlic smell to change from 'up your nose' to 'French restuarant').
Meanwhile you have been lightly simmering your broad beans in a separate saucepan. Don't do this for too long because you don't want them to go mushy, but I can't tell you exactly how long. My method is to wait until I can hear myself say 'oops, too long.'
Pour the stock into first main saucepan. Judge the volume of stock by a guess at how much you need to fill your soup bowls. Simmer for a bit.
Drain broad beans, then slip them out of their skins. Remember this is the fun bit of the recipe and not a chore.
Throw them into the main soup pan and let them warm up again.
Take pan off the heat and give the contents a short whizz with a hand blender, or mash with a potato masher, or fork, or go the whole hog and put it in a proper blender.
Pour soup into bowls and sprinkle on some pepper.
Serve with bread liberally buttered with butter.
Yum!
