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Food painting artwork

30 x 30cm oil on linen. As this soup manages to be easy, delicate, robust and thrifty all at once, I went looking for inspiration on how to portray these qualities and tie celery into this somehow. And so I went all the way back to the textile designs of the 1950's when thrifty homemade soup was the only soup. I think I landed on a simple, bold yet delicate, retro composition based on celery that's just right.


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The meatless meals recipe

This soup manages to be both delicate and robust in flavour. Made up on the spot by my husband while we were away on holiday one summer and short on ingredients. It rocked and as usual we then had to reverse engineer and test test test how it was done. This is a lightweight soup for warm weather that won't leave you hot and bothered from slaving over the stove, or indegestibly full.

500g celery, about half a bunch, cleaned, chopped, no leaves

1/2 medium onion, chopped

1 medium potato about 150g, roughly chopped small

4 cups / 1L stock

1 cup milk

1 tablespoon butter

salt to taste

Saute the onion in butter until lightly golden.

Add celery and sweat (lid on folks!) until the celery is softened.

Add the stock and potato and simmer, lid off, for about 20 minutes or until all the ingredients are very soft. 

Puree / blend.

Add milk and gently reheat.

Salt to taste.

Serves 4.