Everything but the sink vegetable soup

Do you ever get to the end of the week and realize that yet again, you overshopped at the start of the week and are now left with an array of vegetables that are either half used or about to expire? Don't throw them out. Salvage what you can and make a soup. Soups would have to be my favorite form of food. You can basically have any meal in the world as a soup.

What your left over vegetables look like may be quite different to what I have left over but regardless it works.

Trick is to separate the hard veggies from the leafy ones, and cook them in stages. The recipe here is based on what I had in the fridge.

Best thing is you can freeze your soup too if you don't finish it all or have enough mouths to feed.

Prep time: 10 mins

Cooking time: 30 mins

Serves: 4

Ingredients

1/2 white onion

4 cloves of garlic

1/2 large zucchini

1/2 large carrot

1 cup of spinach

5 mushrooms

1 baby romaine lettuce

2 medium potatoes

1/2 brocoli

1 small cauliflower

1/2 cup parsley

500ml vegetable stock

500ml water

1/2 tsp thyme

Salt and Pepper to taste

Method

1. Chop all your vegetables into even bite size pieces. For the leafy vegetables, loosely cut them up.

2. Dice your onion, and smash your garlic.

3. In a large saucepan, heat up the olive oil, and add the onions and mushrooms and sautée until the onions are translucent. Add the thyme and garlic and stir for a further minute until fragrant.

4. Add all your chopped hard vegetables into the pot, then pour in your stock and enough water that it only just covers the vegetables. Keep your leafy vegetables to the side.

5. Let the vegetables boil away, stirring occasionally to make sure they all get even cooking.

6. When the hard vegetables become soft, add in the leafy vegetables and let them cook for a further 5 minutes.

7. Once cooked, take off the heat and taste. Season with salt and pepper to your liking.

8. Next, blend the vegetables until it becomes a smooth soupy texture. If you're using a regular blender you'll need to wait until it cools down first to avoid exploding everywhere from the heat. If you're using an immersion blender you can blend straight away into the saucepan.

9. Serve and further season to your liking if needed.

Notes

• If you have mushrooms like I did, sautée them with the onions at the beginning so you get a full flavor from them.

• You can add any kind of spices into it, lending Moroccan, Indian or Middle Eastern flavors if you wish.

• I added a dollop of yoghurt and chives on top of mine just before eating but you can add whatever you like. Crispy bacon bits, croutons, truffle oil...see what works for you.

• If you want to add protein to this, you can cook beans with the rest of the veggies or add silken tofu the moment you add the leafy vegetables. You won't taste it at all and it'll give you what you need.