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By Root 2198 0

add the bread to the mushrooms. Stir until the bread amalgamates with the mushrooms. Now add the stock, and cook for about 15 minutes until the mushrooms are quite soft. Put the soup through the coarse mesh of the mouli, then through the next finest one. Or better still, sidestep these two operations by blending the soup in the electric liquidiser. You will not get the thick or smooth purée usually associated with mushroom soup, but rather a mixture of the consistency of thin cream broken by all the minuscule particles of the mushrooms. Return it to the rinsed-out saucepan and when it is reheated add the boiling cream and another tablespoon of parsley, this time chopped very fine indeed. These quantities should make enough for four.

POTAGE DE CÈPES

DRIED MUSHROOM SOUP

A useful stand-by soup. Stock is needed, and if necessary this can be from either a meat or chicken bouillon cube, but the ideal is stock made from the carcase and giblets of a duck. For each pint of stock the other ingredients are oz. of dried cèpes (usually called dried mushrooms; Italian are the best), a tomato and a crushed clove of garlic. Cream or eggs or Parmesan cheese or parsley and ham.

Soak the dried cèpes in cold water to cover for 10-15 minutes; drain them, put them with the garlic and chopped tomato into the stock, cover the saucepan and simmer very gently, preferably in the oven, which will cause less evaporation of the liquid than direct heat, for about an hour, until the cèpes are absolutely soft. Strain the soup and discard the cèpes; their flavour has all gone into the stock.

The soup can now be enriched with three or four tablespoons of cream or with grated Parmesan cheese stirred into it just before serving, or with a thickening of egg yolks beaten with a little lemon juice. Or it can be served as it is with the addition of a little finely chopped ham and parsley.

POTAGE DE MARRONS DAUPHINOIS

CHESTNUT SOUP

To skin and peel chestnuts, score them across on the rounded side, and put them in a baking tin in a gentle oven (gas No. 3, 330 deg. F.) for 15 to 20 minutes, or else drop them in boiling water and boil them for about 8 minutes. Extract a few at a time, so that the rest do not get cool, for then they become difficult to peel. Squeeze each chestnut so that the shell cracks, and then with the aid of a small knife it is quite easy to remove both skins. For this soup you need 1 lb. of chestnuts.

Prepare a vegetable broth from 2 carrots, 2 leeks, a small head of celery with the leaves, 1 onion, 2 or 3 sprigs of parsley, all cleaned, sliced and melted in 1 oz. of butter in a heavy saucepan. When the vegetables soften and begin to look transparent pour in 2 pints of cold water, season with salt, cover the pan, and simmer very gently for one hour. Now pour off half the liquid, and in this stew the shelled and skinned chestnuts until they are quite soft. Sieve, then thin the resulting purée with the rest of the strained vegetable broth. When heating up add a teacupful of hot milk, and see that the seasoning is correct. Serves four.

Although all this may sound a lot of fuss to make a chestnut soup, it is well worth the trouble.

The vegetables cooked for the stock should not be wasted. Sieved and thinned with milk, a lump of butter and some chopped parsley added immediately before serving, they make an excellent soup for next day.

POTAGE MOUSSELINE DE CÉLERIS

MOUSSELINE OF CELERY SOUP

Make a chicken broth in the usual way with a chicken carcase, the feet and giblets, an onion, a carrot and a heart of celery cut into small pieces. Simmer very gently with water to cover for about an hour. Strain. Measure the broth, and allow 1 egg yolk to each pint. Beat the yolks very well in a bowl, with a few drops of lemon juice. Pour a little of the heated broth over the eggs, whisking all the time with a fork. Return this to the rest of the hot broth in the saucepan and heat again, stirring all the time until the soup is hot and slightly thickened, but do not let it boil.

Those who like the aniseed flavour of fennel will