"Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it." – Mary Oliver

Tenderheart Cook #14 and #15

Cooking my way through the Tenderheart Cookbook. Both these cooks happened before we went overseas.

Celery Leaf Soup

We got a half piece of celery in our veggie box and it had a heap of leaves attached so Celery Leaf soup seemed like a good way to make use of something that could have easily gone in the bin.

The Quick Lowdown:

  • Ingredients: Apart from the celery leaves it contains potatoes, stock, garlic and green onions, so mostly things I normally have around.
  • Prep-work: Just cutting for the soup, but I also made Garlicky Chilli Oil from the book, which added work, but the oil can be stored in the fridge for months.
  • Dirty dishes: Cutting board, knife, saucepan, stick blend.
  • Taste: I made this for a family dinner and no one complained.
  • Family-friendly: Maybe depending on your family’s tolerance for green things. I also recommend serving with chilli oil drizzled on the top.
  • Regular rotation worthy: This will get cooked again when I have celery leaves handy. It would make a good winter lunch.

Wombok and (Pomelo) Mandarin Salad with Coconut-peanut Crunch

The recipe calls for pomelo but I made it with mandarins so it was probably sweeter and less bitter than it would have been

The Quick Lowdown:

  • Ingredients: There was a fairly long list of ingredients.
  • Prep-work: Fairly easy, with just some cutting up. The peanuts coconut and red chilli flakes had to be dry toasted in a frying pan for the coconut-peanut crunch.
  • Dirty dishes: Cutting board, knife, frying pan, a couple of bowls, spoons, jam jar to mix the dressing in.
  • Taste: This was a good salad. I could have eaten the coconut-peanut crunch by itself.
  • Family-friendly: yes.
  • Regular rotation worthy: Maybe, if I remember this when I have wombok in my box.