Leek, Potato and Kale Soup recipe

We all need some warming dishes to keep us going through these cold, dark months. Using up some leftover vegetables, I whipped up this delicious soup providing warmth and lots of goodness. Based on this recipe from the BBC food community, I made a soup that I'm sure will become a recipe I make over and over again.

For this recipe you will need:

3 leeks (washed)
4 potatoes (peeled)
1 litre of vegetable stock
3 good handfuls of kale (washed, cut into small pieces with stalks removed)
Splash of milk

First, you will start off washing your leeks, slicing them longways and then cutting them into small slices. Put a pan on the hob with a splash of olive oil, whilst this is warming cut the potato into smallish chunks and add to the pan with the leek.

Cook for 5 minutes stirring intermittently to ensure nothing sticks to the pan or is burnt. Add the stock, stir well and cover for around 10 minutes, or until the potato is soft. When cooked through remove from the heat and liquidise with an immersion blender. Don't fully blend as it's nice to keep a few chunks of potato throughout. Make sure to season with salt and pepper to your taste.

Put your soup back on the heat and add your kale in. First, leave this sit on the top with the lid on to steam through, then stir in after a few minutes. When you're happy the kale has softened, add a splash or two of milk to make it more creamy and then serve.

This soup is certainly a Winter favourite in our house and I'll be making it again soon.

What do you think, will this be on your to try list?

What's cooking? Recipe ideas!

I've always said on my blog how much I love to cook. I much prefer taking some time out of my day to make a meal than to sit with a ready meal after five minutes in the microwave. It's better for you to cook and I think it makes you feel good about yourself like you've achieved something for cooking a lovely meal.

Over the past few weeks, I've been cooking up a storm making all sorts of hearty meals for the rest of the family.

So what have I been cooking?

Beef casserole - This was really easy to make with a store bought sachet and fresh ingredients. Simply cut the beef and carrots, add them to a casserole dish with water and the sachet and then cook in the oven for an hour and three quarters! Yum!

Cauliflower cheese - Super easy to make! All you need is cheese sauce, which you can make fresh, buy or use a sachet and cooked cauliflower. Mix these two in a casserole dish and cook for 10/20 minutes.

Chilli con carne - Again I cheated and bought a sachet to help. Basically this entailed cooking the beef (and I added mushrooms) then adding a tin of tomatos, kidney beans and some water. You then let this simmer for 20minutes. Done!

Nachos - This was one of those days when you just can't be bothered to cook anything! So all I did was put some nachos on a plate, added salsa and cheese then place under the grill for 5 minutes until the cheese was melted.

Pie, mash and vegetables - This was a store bought pie that took about 30minutes to cook and whilst it was cooking I made the mashed potato and vegetables!

Butternut squash soup - We bought a butternut squash in the shopping hoping to make soup and the same week I came across Abundance of Erica's recipe. This made a yummy sweet soup!

As you can see these are all pretty simple dishes that you can easily make in no time. Although I did take the cheats way out on a few of these dishes I think it is much better for you than eating ready meal rubbish!

I hope I inspire you to get in the kitchen a bit more? Let me know if you cook anything!