Frugal! - The Accidental Smallholder

Posted: Sunday 27 December, 2009

by Rosemary at 6:01pm in Anything goes Comments closed

With the prospect of a new mortgage, dana nd I are trying to save money. Sort of. Actually, we have this conversation every year, sometimes with more effect than others.

Anyway, we've got off to a reasonable start; when we went for bread yesterday, the supermarket had loads of boxes of mushrooms for 17p, so we bought 6 and Dan made mushroom soup. It's one of my favourites and it cost about 10p per portion.

This is the recipe Dan uses:

For 6 (small by our standards) portions

Melt 1/2 oz of butter and cook 1/2 a medium onion and a garlic clove, both finely chopped, gently for about 5 minutes until softened but not browned. Add 1 1/2 oz plain flour and cook gently for a minute or so. Gradually add 1 1/4 pint of vegetable stock, stirring all the time. Add 5oz of sliced mushrooms and a tablespoon of chopped parsley. Cover, bring to the boil and simmer gently for about 10-15 minutes. Cool and puree.

Saute 4oz of sliced mushrooms in some butter unil they begin to brown, then addto the soup; simmer gently for three minutes. Stir in 3 fl oz of single cream and season to taste. Garnish with chopped fresh parsley.

This soup freezes well, so is good to make in a large batch. Especially if you can get cheap mushrooms!