More pork soup

Following precedents at references 1 and 2 - at April and December last year not as thick on the ground as I had thought - 6oz of pearl barley into 3.5 pints of water at around 11:00.

Some time later, add onion and celery. About 12:30 add two thirds of a coarsely chopped pork tenderloin. About 13:00 add quite a lot of white cabbage.

Some left over boiled potatoes.

Saucepan a bit full at this point, so cook the mushrooms in a little butter and water in a separate pan. Mushrooms from Waitrose which seemed to need peeling but which were quite difficult to peel. Cups whole, stalks sliced. Separate cooking seemed to work quite well, with the mushrooms only being lightly cooked, rather than stewed to chewy oblivion.

On the plate, at about 13:30, about half an hour late. We did something over half at the first sitting.

Rounded off with a spot of plum crumble to add a bit more carbohydrate, fruit sugar and fruit acid to the mix.

Not quite so good on day 2, with thicker liquor and softer cabbage, but rejuvenated a bit by boiling the balance of the pork in a little water and adding that in. Cooking the other half of the mushrooms and serving separate, as before.

A good, cheap, two days' eating. Pork tenderloin back on BH's shopping list and one will find its way into our freezer in due course.

Perhaps the fact that this soup does not stand that well once cooked, is part of why you do not get soups of this sort in restaurants, despite their being very easy to make. Or is it that a restaurant keeper could not bring himself to put real meat into a soup? What's wrong with tomatoes, sugar and monosodium glutamate?

A picture of Broadgate Circus, sent in by a correspondent yesterday, now emerging from a very large, round hole in the ground. Given its location near the old Roman city wall, looking appropriately like a Roman circus, the sort which had gladiators and other wild animals. Now, I understand, mainly intended for the nocturnal amusements of city boys and people from Essex, brought in by train to nearby Moorgate, Liverpool Street and Broad Street stations. St. Paul's, horizon centre.

While this morning, I rose early to catch a very yellow, full, or near full, moon just sinking into the trees on the western skyline. While by 07:00, a couple of hours later, I could see the remains of a light frost on our extension roof.

PS: Saturday lunchtime: a sharp shower of hail, lasting about 5 minutes. A shower which both started and stopped very abruptly. The ground dusted with white for a short while.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/12/pork-soup.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/04/pork-soup.html.