This week the Morning Group made Butternut Squash Soup (similar to pumpkin!).  We used peelers and knives to prepare the vegetables.  Both groups made and tasted Irish Soda Bread. The soda bread got a bit sticky!  We marked the dough with a cross on the top, dividing it into 4, using a knife.  (According to Irish folklore this is to this is to let the fairies out!)  Here are some photos of us busy cooking and tasting the soup.  The recipes follow the photos.

Butternut Squash Soup:

1 butternut squash
3 carrots
1 onion
1 tbsp vegetable oil
water/stock
2-3 tbsp milk
herbs (we used rosemary and sage from the garden)
black pepper
a ‘pipkin of salt’ (like in the story ‘Pumpkin Soup’ by Helen Cooper)

Peel and chop the vegetables (add others too if you want). Add them to a large pan with the oil. Cover and ‘sweat’ the vegetables for 10 minutes on a low heat until beginning to soften. Add the water/stock to cover the vegetables, herbs and seasoning. Simmer until the vegetables are soft. Purée using a hand blender.

Irish Soda Bread

We used James Martin’s Irish Soda Bread recipe.

Please let us know if you have other soda bread recipes we could try.