Celeriac and Bacon Soup

Now that the cold weather has turned "this is bullshit" cold, a nice warming bowl of soup is on the menu tonight. The chosen soup being celeriac and bacon.

Many people have heard of celeriac but not too many have seen or tasted it.

Celeriac is a root vegetable with a bulbous hypocotyl, (the part of the stem of an embryo plant beneath the stalks of the seed leaves and directly above the root).Typically, celeriac is harvested when its hypocotyl is 10–14 cm in diameter. It is edible raw or cooked, and tastes similar to the stalks of common celery. Celeriac may be roasted, stewed, blanched, or mashed. Sliced celeriac occurs as an ingredient in soups, casseroles, and other savory dishes.








As with most soups, this is an easy and basic one to make. 
For this recipe, I used the following:

1 Leek-sliced thinly
2 Rashers of Bacon-diced
1 Celeriac "Bulb"-peeled and cubed
2 Potatoes-peeled and cubed
500-750ml Chicken Stock

Using a little olive oil and a tablespoon of butter, sweat down the leek in a medium size saucepan,over medium heat, for 4-5 mins than add the bacon and cook for a further 5 mins.

Add the celeriac and potato and enough stock to just cover. Bring to the boil and cook until tender.
When ready and in batches, transfer to a blender and process until you have a smooth and creamy texture. 





Ladle into bowls and serve topped with bacon crumble.

Bacon Crumble

2 rashers bacon, cut into an extremely fine dice (about 2mm)
1/4 cup coarse fresh breadcrumbs (I use Panko Bread Crumbs)

Sauté the bacon in a frying pan. When the bacon is starting to cook and release its fat, add the breadcrumbs. Stir continually, until the breadcrumbs are golden and the bacon pieces are crunchy. 

Taste and season with salt if required – this will depend on how salty the bacon is – then drain on a paper towel. 

Soft Shell Crabs

There's not too many, if any, people I know who enjoy seafood that would knock back a meal that had soft shell crab in it. 

Many sushi restaurants now have soft shell crab sushi rolls.

When I discovered a few months back that our local seafood shop had them, I knew then that it would not be long before I purchased a box to try a couple of yet to be decided recipes.

Two weeks ago I acquired my first box of frozen crabs. I would loved to have been able to get hold of some fresh crabs but that will never happen due to location, time of year, lunar phase, molting and something to do with unicorn burps.

FYI (Northern Hemisphere) (Australia)

Soft shell crabs are not their own species, despite what many people may think. They're just a regular crab (in the U.S. they're often blue crabs) that have gotten too big for their shells. In order to keep on growing, they have to shed their shell to grow a new, bigger one. This typically happens after the first full moon in May and continues to occur until October.
To shed their shell, they form a new "coat" underneath, and then puff themselves up to break their current shell. Once they release themselves, the crab's coat will harden in just a couple of hours into a new shell. It's a very short window for fishermen to catch the crabs during this transition, so instead they're caught a couple of days before molting and kept in a tank until they remove their shell.

At a cost of $22 a box with 10 in the box, although frozen, I saw value in my purchase.

Now to the chosen recipes. I decided to go with Soft Shelled Crabs Meuniere and Panko-Crusted Soft Shelled Crab with Ginger Ponzu Sauce.

Preparing the crabs for cooking involved "cutting off the face", removing the underside flap and the gills (dead man's fingers).

Soft Shelled Crab Meuniere

Milk soaked and dusted with flour.

Ready for pan fry. 

Burnt butter and Tarragon Sauce

Panko-Crusted Soft Shelled Crab

 with Ginger Ponzu Sauce.

Both plates of crab were delicious. A definite must do for future guests.

What else was delicious tonight?

Lime and Coconut Ice Cream!!!