When I made this soup I had recently made a tasty celery soup from a French food magazine but I could only half remember it and of what I could remember, I knew it needed a decent portion of fresh parsley. With only a handful in my kitchen at the time, I needed something to spin out the flavour of the celery.

A strong, salty, dry cheese was perfect for the job – in this instance a little pecorino. Parmesan would likely work just as well, maybe in smaller quantity given its pungent nature.

I used some stale bread cubes I had in the freezer to thicken it – you could boil some floury potatoes instead if time was not of the essence, or use left over roasties or even mash from another meal.

The liquid was a mixture of milk & water with a little vegetable stock powder – try whatever your preferred milk is. All-water could work with potatoes but I reckon it might lack something of the creaminess I like in a soup if it was all stock & bread. By all means give it a go.

Serves 2

Ingredients

Head of Celery	1
Handful Fresh Parsley	1
Vegetable Stock Powder	2	teaspoons
Boiling Water	150ish	millilitres
Milk	150ish	millilitres
Stale Bread Cubes or Floury Potato (Cooked)	1	handful
Dijon Mustard	2	teaspoons
Pecorino	30	grams

Main Equipment

1. Blender

Method

1. Peel the outer stalks of celery to remove any stringy bits – even with a good blender these will detract from a smooth texture.
2. Remove and reserve the celery leaves.
3. Halve the celery stalks and place in a saucepan with enough water to just cover.
4. Add 2 teaspoons of vegetable stock powder, or use half a stock cube (a whole will be too salty for 2 portions, especially with the addition of cheese).
5. Simmer the celery over a medium-low heat with the lid on. You want the celery to be completely soft without all the water evaporating.
6. Once completely soft, place the celery and any remaining braising liquid into a blender (or a suitably sized container if using a stick blender, likely the saucepan if you aren’t too precious about blending in your pans).
7. Add enough liquid to make 2 portions of soup – at a guess about 300ml in total. This can be a mixture of your preferred milk and boiling water, experiment with the ratios to get the richness you like but either way, don’t worry too much, all can be adjusted later.
8. Blend to a smooth liquid.
9. Add bread cubes (or your cooked floury potato) and blend again. If using potato, it needs to be a floury variety (i.e. one that gets a fluffy texture when cooked as opposed to staying smooth) so that it disintegrates into the liquid and does the job of thickening. A left over roast potato or two would probably work, the crispy outer (if indeed it is still crispy once cold) will do no harm.
10. Best to add the bread (or potato) a little at a time, until you achieve your desired consistency. If you go too far, just add more milk or water.
11. Add the celery leaves and a handful of fresh parsley, reserving a little to garnish if you wish.
12. Crumble in the pecorino, reserving a little to garnish, and blend again.
13. Season with salt & pepper and add Dijon mustard to taste. Again, add a little, blend, taste, repeat until it tastes good to you.
14. Garnish with the reserved herbs & cheese. I had some caper leaves I was looking to use up so I fried half a dozen of these until crisp and sprinkled on top. I’m not sure they added much, other than a small degree of satisfaction of making a little bit of progress through this ill-conceived purchase.