



Here's a solution: use your food scraps to make soup. Today I made a most satisfactory green soup from the following scraps.





Broccoli stalks. I've tried planting these before to regrow them into new broccoli but haven't had any success, though apparently it's possible. I always save the stalks after I've eaten the heads, and today I had a few that I'd cut up and put in a tub to throw in the wormery later. They were looking a bit manky, but then I thought I'd try and slice off the edges, to see what was underneath, and behold:













Some perfectly edible organic matter. Next:





Celery leaves. First thing I managed to grow from seed this year was a couple of celery plants. They've come a long quite nicely. The leaves are fairly bitter when eaten raw, but something I've used in recipes before for a bit of extra kick.









Leeks. I've enthused about the wonders of leeks several times, and spring onions (scallions) - I've enthused about the wonders of leeks several times, and experimented with regrowing them before. I'll have more to say on this another time, but suffice to say they do great just in a jar of water. Likewise for(scallions) - another favourite of mine.









Pea shoots. Microgreens are very much the thing in my life just now. The few additional Microgreens are very much the thing in my life just now. The few additional dried peas I had from my first experiments and had sown around the edges of my bean nursery have sprouted very well the last few days, so I sliced their heads off and threw them in the pot.









I boiled these wonderful greeny greens up for a ten minutes with a little bit of salt, sage and olive oil, simmered for another ten minutes, and blended. Don't believe me? Just look at the evidence:

















Here is a portion of the soup in a mug:









I really enjoy drinking soup out of a mug. Try it sometime, I promise you'll enjoy it too. Don't believe me? Here's the proof:

















And so it was that I disproved that popular adage of insufferable conservative killjoys: There's no such thing as a free lunch. In fact, there is. And very tasty it was too. Ha.















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