Chunky Vege and Bacon Hock Soup

So I was really tempted to name this post "The Vege Scraps Strike Again," but then I didn't. Ok so it is cold, like we just bought 10 boxes of thermals from Kathmandu cold. Seriously Rotorua makes Auckland feel like Bali, and it isn't even actually winter yet. 

With winter, comes soup season. Seriously though, there's nothing more inviting than coming home on a cold, wet, windy day and digging into a chunky, warm soup with some crusty bread. With soup recipes, a lot of them call for stock. This might just be me, but I personally feel like if you are going to make a soup with powdered stock, why don't you just have a continental cup a soup? Soup to me should be full bodied, nourishing and wholesome, but who on earth has time to make stock and then make soup? 

This is where the vege scrap stock strikes again... seriously I'm just a bit too obsessed with that phrase at the moment. Because you can make this stock when you get a spare minute and freeze it for months, it is literally at your disposal any time you need AND it literally costs nothing to make because as the name suggests, you make the stock from scraps. Check out my pea and lentil soup recipe for the vege scrap stock instructions. 

Jeremy has just started solids, so I've been making tonnes of baby food, so the idea of a thick pureed soup, didn't seem to appetizing for me. In my head I was almost thinking a minestrone type soup with chunks of bacon on the top. The slow cooker is also my favourite "baby is teething" kitchen appliance. 

Really, this soup could totally be made in the slow cooker if you didn't mind the vegetables completely broken down. All you would need to do is saute your veges, shallots, garlic and spices before they went in the slow cooker.

As you can see below, I didn't even bother defrosting my stock, I just let the slow cooker do the work for me! The other thing to note with the soup, feel free to use what ever veges you have on hand. Soup is a great way to hide your not so fresh but still edible veges 

I really feel like its the use of spice and fresh rosemary in this soup that gives it that extra depth of flavour but if these aren't things you have in your pantry feel free to replace with all spice or dried mixed herbs

Now for the best part of this recipe. Definitely helps achieve your five plus a day goals, it's cheap to make AND Shyra-Beth my chicken nuggy obsessed toddler ate two whole bowls of it including all the veges. Winner Winner Bacon Hock Dinner. About $8 in total for this meal which gave all three of us dinner and lunch the next day

Chunky Vege & Bacon Hock Soup

1 Bacon hock

2 litres of vege scrap stock

1 litre of water

2 cups of diced seasonal veges of your choice (I used squash, carrot, celery) 

Olive Oil

1 T Rosemary

1 shallot diced

2 cloves of garlic

1t cumin

1t coriander

1 can of diced tomatoes

Optional
1/2 cup of red lentils

1 cup of small pasta (By small i mean elbows or macaroni, I used these novelty bear shaped ones) 

1. Cook the Bacon Hock in the vege scrap stock. Either simmering on a stove top for 1.5 hours or on high in the slow cooker for about 4-5 hours, until the flesh is easy to pull off 

2. Remove the bacon hock from the stock and strip off the meat. Set the meat aside for later

3. In a large stock pot heat olive oil on a medium heat and add shallot, garlic, rosemary and your veges (I didn't add my squash at this point because I didn't want it to go mushy) 

4. Sweat the veges down until softened

5. Add the cumin and coriander powder and let it saute for a further few minutes

6. Transfer the stock from the slow cooker to the pot and add in 1 litre of water 

7. Bring to the boil (I added in my squash at this point)

8. Add in the can of diced tomatoes, lentils and pasta and lower the heat to a gentle simmer until the pasta is cooked through and lentils have broken down

9. Season and serve with chunks of bacon on the top