I was feeling soupy at lunchtime but we had few ingredients, so I made a stone soup with ingredients from our herb garden.First, I made stock from last night's chicken carcass, with half an old nectarine thrown in for flavouring. Most popular soups contain a fair amount of sweetening, so adding fruit to the stock isn't as odd as you may think. If you buy commercially-made soup, look at the sugars: Campbell's contains 12g, their Healthy Request Tomato Soup has 10g, and Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup has 10g—all more than a can of my perennial favourite nutritional whipping boy, Coke.
Adding sugar to your stock adds flavour and can help you choose less salt, if salt use concerns you. I'd rather add a naturally-occurring sweetener like fruit, so in the pot my half-nectarine went. (Why half? Simply because the other half was rotty-looking so I composted it.) I love the challenge of a low-waste kitchen, and for the price of old chicken bones, half a nectarine, some ginger tea, and a pot full of water, I had delicious stock after a couple of hours, maybe three.
I added rosemary, lavender, oregano, green onions and basil from my garden, plus curry leaves, celery and bits of the leftover chicken meat. Not counting the time it took to simmer the stock to golden perfection, making the soup itself took about 20 minutes. I would have let the herbs cook in longer, but I was hungry!
I enjoyed my healthy-tasting soup with a side of Irish Soda Bread (from Bittman's recipe) which fits the stone-soup style of cheap ingredients: flour, buttermilk (or yogurt or soured milk), baking powder and baking soda, salt and water. It makes a funny-looking loaf, but is quick and easy to make and for some reason, the kids love it. I made this loaf with half rye flour and half all-purpose flour so it was denser than usual, making it perfect for dipping in my stone soup. What a heartwarming and health-inducing lunch.