Simple Winter Vegetable Soup

Many people neglect the great vegetables of winter. Left to their simplicity in this soup, root vegetables have never tasted so good! I took advantage of the various winter root vegetables that have been showing up in our weekly CSA and made a batch of simple winter vegetable soup that will feed us all week! The recipe makes about 8 cups.

Simple Winter Vegetable Soup

Ingredients:

2 Tbsp. butter
2 onions, chopped
2 carrots, peeled, quartered and sliced
8 cups of chicken or vegetable broth
1 potato, peeled and diced
1 turnip, rutabaga or kohlrabi, peeled and diced
1 celery root (celeriac), peeled and diced 
1 bay leaf
1 tsp. Celery seed
Juice from ½ lemon
Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions:

Melt the butter in a large soup pot; add the onions and the carrots. Cook, stirring often, over medium heat for 5 minutes. Add the broth, potato, turnip, celery root, bay leaf, celery seed, and lemon juice and simmer for 20-30 minutes. The vegetables should be nice and tender. Season the soup with salt and pepper to taste.

I imagine this soup would freeze well although we managed to enjoy it without having to freeze any!

Having a CSA has been so much fun. We have ended up trying so many vegetables that we never have eaten before! For example until we received a celery root or celeriac in our weekly order I had never cooked or even eaten one before! Not sure I even had noticed one in the grocery store. Recently I cooked one celery root with potatoes, and then mashed everything up, the mixture was delicious!

You could make a simple winter vegetable soup with whatever vegetables you have on hand. Feel free to substitute what you like or what you have on hand. Don’t be afraid to try something new you might be pleasantly surprised!