Vegetable Broth with added zing

A couple of weeks ago, I was delighted to win a copy of Jo Pratt's new book, "In The Mood For Healthy Food" from the lovely Supergoldenbakes. It's a lovely book, packed with healthy-yet-not-cranky recipes that fit in very well with the way we love to eat.

This weekend the veg drawer of the fridge was crammed with the tail ends of veg left over from other dishes - a couple of parsnips, a few sticks of celery, the ONE leek so far ready in the garden, a couple of carrots, a tired lemon and the remains of packs of parsley and thyme (yes, we've used up the supply in the garden at the moment and had to resort to buying some of our herbs!). Thumbing through my new book, I spotted "Winter vegetable broth with zesty parsley dressing"  - basically a standard vegetable and pearl barley broth but served with a "pesto" of parsley, lemon rind and juice an olive oil, all whizzed together in the blender.

The soup was delicious - we were both a bit apprehensive about whether the light, zingy, summery looking sauce would work with the rich, hearty traditional  winter flavours of the soup, but the two complemented each other perfectly. It gave us lots and lots of lovely veg in one serving AND cleared a bit of space in the fridge - double whammy!

I'm making another visit to Kitchen Clearout at Madhouse Family Reviews



and also sharing at Extra Veg at Fuss Free Flavours and Utterly Scrummy Food For Families