Vegetable Salad [vegetarian]

Although I realize that outside my country, this salad is often called 'Russian Salad', here we all know it as 'Vegetable Salad'. It was the most popular salad in Poland for many, many years. No party, celebration or social gathering happened without this dish. Even preparing this salad was a bit of a social occasion, as it was always made in big quantities and very often, at least 2 people were cutting the vegetables and chatting while they were doing it. I remember from my childhood that the women from my family were always cutting the vegetables very thinly because we believed that if the cubes were too big, the salad would not taste as good as it should ;) Nowadays, I actually prefer the salad not to be made of such tiny pieces. It still tastes great, but the preparation doesn’t take as long as it used to in the past.

What I also like about this salad is that you end up with a great by-product – good quality vegetable stock that can be used as a base for many different soups. Obviously, it also works the other way around: you cook the stock that you need and then you use the vegetables to make the salad. Whichever way you are going to do it; you will enjoy the two results!

INGREDIENTS (for 4-6 portion):

4 carrots, peeled,

2 parsnips, peeled,

0.25 celery (approx. 200g), peeled and cut into 2 pieces,

1 small leek*,

1 celery stalk*,

2 apples,

3-4 sour gherkins,

1 tin green peas,

3 tbsp mayonnaise,

salt and pepper.

METHOD:

1. Put the carrots, parsnips, celery, leek* and celery stalk* to a big pan, pour 1-1.5l of water, add salt and pepper and bring to boil.
2. Lower the heat and cook the vegetables until they are tender (approx. 20 minutes).
3. Take the vegetables out from the stock, cool them down.
4. In the meantime, cut the apples and sour gherkins into 0.5-1 cm cubes. After you chop the gherkins, make sure to squeeze out the liquid.
5. When the cooked vegetables are cool, cut the carrots, parsnips and the celery into the 0.5 -1cm cubes (the celery stalk and leek can be discarded).
6. Put all the chopped vegetables, apples and gherkins to a bowl, add the mayonnaise, seasoning and stir well.

* optional, required only if you are making the stock as well.

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Spicy Parsnip Soup [vegetarian]

Parsnip is a much underrated vegetable. At least that was the case in our (Polish) family for a very long time. I can remember my mother using it in 2 dishes only: as one of the ingredients of stock and of Polish vegetable salad. Actually, it was my husband who introduced me and my side of the family to roasted parsnip and we all were surprised how delicious it tasted just by itself.

Since then I have been more open minded and used it for other meals as well, I even plan to bake a parsnip cake one day! However for now, I am sharing a parsnip soup recipe that I have tested many times. The soup is creamy and smooth, and the slightly nutty taste of parsnip is very well complimented by curry powder.

INGREDIENTS (for 4 portions):

2 tbsp rapeseed oil,

1 onion, peeled and chopped,

2 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped,

1 bay leaf,

1-2 sprigs of parsley,

0.5-1.5 tbsp curry powder (the amount depends on the heat of the powder you use and on your own preferences),

500g parsnips, peeled and chopped,

1 l vegetable stock,

250 ml milk,

salt and pepper.

METHOD:

1. Heat up the oil in a big pot.
2. Add the onion, garlic, bay leaf, parsley, 0.5 tbsp curry powder and parsnip, stir everything well to coat in the oil and curry, and cook on medium heat for 10-15 minutes.
3. Add the stock and cook the soup for another 15-20 minutes until the vegetables are soft.
4. Liquidize the soup, season it (if it is not spicy enough, you can add more curry), add the milk and bring to boil.

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