Spinach is a garden plant native to the southern countries of the Middle East. In the national cuisines of Greece, Cyprus, Turkey, it is present in different forms: as a side dish, salad ingredient, pie filling. In Europe, this unpretentious plant began to be cultivated already in the Middle Ages. Its undemanding to growing conditions has made spinach one of the most common garden crops. The beneficial properties and high nutritional value of spinach determined its important role in diet and baby nutrition. In France, spinach puree is an ordinary dish in school canteens
Among the many dishes of fleshy green leaves, spinach puree soup is especially popular. It can be prepared from fresh or frozen leaves. Neither the beneficial properties nor the palatability of frozen spinach are almost the same as fresh.
Even in the northern regions of Russia, this unpretentious plant can produce two crops of green mass, but it was impossible to maintain it. “Freezing” turned out to be a very good way of preserving succulent leaves; it makes it possible to prepare mashed soup with spinach almost all year round.
The greenery of the plant is neutral in taste, therefore it is combined with a variety of products: with dairy products - sour cream, cream, soft cheeses. From it you can cook soups on meat, and on chicken broth, and on water.
Spinach puree soup , the recipe of which is offered here, is not inferior in calorie to soup in meat broth, and undoubtedly surpasses it in useful properties.
To make spinach soup puree, you need to:
- 300 - 500; grams of spinach (fresh or frozen);
- 1 medium-sized carrot;
- 1 onion;
- 50 grams of butter:
- 2 chicken eggs;
- 100 grams of sour cream;
- 1 tablespoon of wheat flour;
- 100 grams of soft cheese.
- 100 grams of white crackers;
- salt, bay leaf, spicy greens (parsley, dill, cilantro).
This spinach puree soup is prepared very quickly, no more than 20 minutes.
Pour water (1.5 liters) into the pan and put it on the fire. In a small saucepan, cook hard-boiled eggs. While the water begins to boil, peel and finely chop the onion, rub the carrots on a coarse grater, and pass them in a deep frying pan in butter. When the onions and carrots become soft, add spinach leaves to them. If they are large, they should be cut. They are passaged for no more than five minutes, otherwise they will lose their bright green color. In another small pan, fry the flour until golden brown and add it to the vegetables. Mix everything and remove the pan from the heat.
In a boiling water we put a bay leaf, salt and the resulting vegetable mixture. Mix well, at the first sign of boiling, turn off the heat. Cheese cut into small cubes. When the soup has cooled slightly, add sour cream and cheese to it and grind everything with a blender to a puree state. We clean the boiled eggs, cut each in half. Finely chop the herbs. Serve the soup right away, hot. We put half the eggs in the plates, pour the mashed soup, sprinkle with greens and crackers on top.
This recipe is the foundation. Replacing some components, it is possible to cook dishes of different tastes on the same basis. This spinach puree soup will be sharper if you add half the sweet pepper and grated root celery into vegetables, take spicy cheese, and already prepared soup sprinkle abundantly with lemon juice. Herbs such as basil or mint are appropriate in this soup. Sometimes housewives add sorrel leaves to such a soup, it gives the dish acid and some harshness. Lemon juice in this case will be redundant, and to give the taste sophistication and softness, you should add a little sugar.
Spinach soup, in which sour cream is replaced with low-fat cream, onions with leeks, and hard-boiled eggs with whipped raw ones, will be gentle and completely dietary. With constant stirring, pour them in a thin stream into boiling soup.