I love to read other people's blogs; I guess it's the voyeur in me wanting to know how other folks live, what they do for fun, what they cook and eat. I especially like to broaden my culinary horizons. It felt like the stars aligned when I saw a fellow blogger mention cream of apple and parsnip soup he and his partner served at a recent dinner party they hosted because for the first time in my life I had purchased parsnips! I've never even eaten parsnips and had no idea what to do with them, so I was happy for the inspiration (Thanks Steve!). I even had apples on hand - can't remember the last time I bought them in Belize - usually you can find only red delicious at the produce stands but this time I found Gala and Granny Smiths. Other finds were wonderfully fresh leeks, which are hit or miss down here, and fresh cream from a Belize dairy. I searched online for recipes, found 3 that looked reasonable, and combined the best parts to make my first ever dish using parsnips - Cream of Roasted Parsnip, Leek, and Apple Soup.
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| Plenty of counterspace next to the air fryer in the outdoor kitchen |
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| I cut up the whites of the leeks and the parsnips for roasting. |
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| Leeks sliced open on the bottom basket. |
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| Parsnips on the top basket. All spritzed with olive oil. I put a spacer basket between the leeks and the parsnips for good air circulation. |
Popped the baskets into the air fryer for 15 minutes at 400F while I cut up the green parts of the leeks and granny smith apples.
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| Nearly 6 cups of loosely packed leeks and apples. |
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| Into a quart of duck broth from our Christmas duck. |
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| After 10 minutes, the parsnips were just beginning to brown. Turned the slices over and spritzed with more olive oil for the last 15 minutes. |
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| Roasted leeks. |
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| Roasted parsnips. |
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| Added the roasted veg and crushed garlic to the pot and simmered for 15 minutes while thinking "oh my gosh - I hope the immersion blender is up to this because I really don't want to use the regular blender." |
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| Kickass immersion blender. |
One of the recipes called for seasoning with cinnamon, curry powder, cardamon, black pepper, salt, and dried coriander. I had everything (except the coriander), so in it all went.
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| Fresh cream from the dairy, so wonderfully different to the cream you get in the US. |
Stirred in the thick cream, heated to almost boiling and here you go -
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| Cream of Roasted Parsnip, Leek, and Apple soup. |
A little greener than many versions because I used the leek greens and didn't peel the green apples. It was/is/will be wonderful. Which is a good thing because it made 3 quarts!
