Dutch Pea Soup

Here Hans and Shyama love this soup, just make this for them and they are really happy.

Especially on winter, but I must admit I make this other seasons too as they will be going on asking me when am I going to make pea soup.
Actually I don't remember whenI made this soup, and latley I have not been baking so much or cooking something new, that I have been taking from my file pictures to post things here.
Fes days before while skyping to sis, she asked why haven't you not poasted anything new and I replied to her, I have not been making anything special these days other than the Jaffa Cakes which I posted last week. And yeah i did make a Rum Drenched Vanilla cake for this weeked :-)

Good thing about making this soup is it is such a huge quantity , that I freeze them in portions and they can have it when ever they like.

Ofcourse this is not a traditional recipe, the one my MIL makes is with pigs trotter etc.... and that is a little bit too much for my delicate Indian stomach to handle or make it.
This is much more my version of Dutch Pea Soup were they will add smoked Sausages in the soup which I didn't hace so I just used normal sausages  to serve them with.
So please I hope the traditionalist would not say you have to add this or something else as I mentioned before this is my adaptation.

400 gm Dry split peas ( soak the night before and wash it again before cooking )

2 onions chopped

200 gm bacon chopped

2 leeks chopped

3 celery sticks chopped

1 carrot chopped

3 large whole potato

1 bay leaf

3 liter of vegetable broth / Chicken broth

Handfull of parsley

1 tsp of dry thym

Pepper and Salt to taste

Few sausages sliced for serving

Few tbsp of oil

In a huge pressure cooker ( I always use pressure cooker for my soup, you canuse a pan but then make sure you increase the cooking time accordinly) add the oil, and when it is heated up add the bacon fry for 2 minutes then add all the chopped vegetables, except for the potato, fry for some 6 minutes till all the vegetables are lightly colored.

Add the soaked and washed peas and rest of the ingridients and clost the pressure pan and cook for 13 minutes ( well that is how long i cook mine inmy pressure cooker)

When everything is cooked, open up the pan,I take out the potatoes and then mix everything else with a hand mixer. Slice the potatoes which will be very soft and add to the mixed soup.

Serve with sliced sausages and croutons.

If you think the soup is too thick you just have to add more broth to make it thinner.



Black & White Wednesday - Chocolate Dress

Mostly I forget to join in Black & White Wednesday and I only remember when I see the beautiful pictures from my blog friends and then I am like that I forgot again.

I would have forgotten again but then with the time difference with us and India, I saw this one in Siri's place yesterday evening and then I said oh yeah I should join up this week.

So as you can see here I am with my B&W picture.

This was taken few months back , when I went to France for a Chocolate Exhibition and as you can see it is a dress made with Chocolate.

I was remarking to my daughter if I had to model this dress and come to the stage, before I reached the stage I will be half Naked as I would have eaten most of the dress.
Thankyou Susan for doing all the hard work.

The picture in Color too.