Still quiet

We're both gradually recovering from this horrible cold, but are still taking it easy whilst we do so.

The main activity outside today was a walk round to the shops for veg and bread and to call in at the office in connection with a new booking for the lodge for next year. Carrots, parsnips and a butternut squash were obtained.

I'd already boiled the carcass of the chicken with an onion, a couple of sticks of celery and some herbs so I decided to make a chicken and veg soup out of the resulting stock. So I cut the squash into quarters, deseeded it and popped it in the oven for a bit whilst I stripped the meat off the bones of the chick.

Then I fished the squash out, added some olive oil to the roasting tray and cut the other veg, plus a couple of onions, into chunks and put them in the tray, coating them with the oil. That lot went in the oven whilst I peeled and cut up the squash. (Squash is much easier to peel if you cook it a bit first; the flesh softens and you can peel the rind off with a small sharp knife.) This latter has been boiled up with the stock for around twenty minutes whilst the veg roasted away, getting soft and a bit browned.

Once the stock has cooled a bit, I'll give it a good whizzing with the Bamix wand to blend in the squash, onion and celery. Then I'll add the roasted veg chunks, the meat off the chick and some fine green beans that needed using up, boil it all up again and there's the soup, yum, yum.

Just the thing to treat a cold on a dull, cool autumnal day...