Fennel, Potato and White Bean Soup

I admit, when we started planting our garden in the spring we may have been a little over ambitious.

Now of some vegetables we have more than we can ever eat.

Fennel is one of those vegetables.

Don't get me wrong, I love fennel! But we have like kilos of it.

So I desperately needed to find a recipe with lots and lots of fennel in it.

That is just one of the probably 5-7 baskets of this year's fennel harvest...

And I found this wonderful summery soup in "Casa Moro - The Second Cookbook" by Sam & Sam Clark of restaurant Moro in London.

Yes, another one from this book. You should get it. It's a fantastic cook book with soo many delicous recipes!

What you need:

170g dried white beans

4 tbsp olive oil

4-5 fennel bulbs (approx. 500g total), finely diced

2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

1 tsp fennel seeds (optional)

3 medium waxy potatoes (approx. 350g), peeled, diced and lightly salted

1 litre bean liquid and/or water or chicken stock

about 40 threads of saffron, infused in 2 tbsp boiling water

2 tbsp chopped fresh fennel leaves

sea salt and pepper

the fennel, potato and bean soup with homemade flatbread and hummus.

Directions:

Soak the white beans overnight, then drain, cover with generously with fresh water and bring to the boil. Simmer for about 1-1.5 hours, until soft, then drain, reserving the cooking liquid.

In another pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat.

Add the diced fennel with a pinch of salt, stir well, lower the heat and fry for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fennel becomes soft and caramelizes.

Add garlic, fennel seeds and potato cubes and fry for another 5 minutes.

Pour in the bean liquid and/or water/stock and the saffron infused water.

Stir well and bring to a gentle simmer.

Cook for another 10-15 minutes or until potatoes are soft, then add the drained beans.

Season with salt and pepper and simmer for a few more minutes before stirring in chopped fennel leaves.

Serve!

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Notes:

• If you don't have fennel tops, chopped parsley or chervil will work as well!
• I served mine with flatbread and homemade hummus (both recipes from the Moro cookbook, as well!), but I can image it being really, really good with fish, served almost like a sauce or stew.