Wild Garlic & Nettle Soup Spring Wild Food Foraging

Recipe for Wild Garlic & Nettle Soup

Wild Garlic and Nettles are abundant in April and May.  Use them to make this soup. Play with the ingredients to add more / less depending on what you have in your kitchen. Adapted from the BBC version. 

Ingredients: 

• 1 tbsp rapeseed / olive oil.  
  
• 25g butter / margarine / dairy free alternative.
  
• 1 onion, dice it finely
• 1 leek, dice it finely
• 2 celery sticks finely diced.
• 1 potatoe finely diced.
• 1.2 litre vegetable stock.
• 300g young nettle leaves (pick the leaves from the top of the plant)
• 200g wild garlic leaves (keep any flowers if you have them). Don't pull them up by the roots or they will not grow next year. Use scissors to clip them off. 
• 3 tbsp milk / soya milk / dairy milk substitute ( I sometimes use goats yoghurt).

Method:

1. Heat the oil and butter in a large saucepan. Add the onion, leek, celery, carrot, potato and a good pinch of salt, and stir until everything is well coated. Cover and sweat gently for 15-20 mins, stirring every so often to make sure that the vegetables don’t catch on the bottom of the pan.
   
2. Pour in the stock and simmer for 10 mins. Add the nettles in several batches, stirring, then add the wild garlic leaves and simmer for 2 mins.
   
3. Remove from the heat and blend using a stick blender or tip into a blender. Return to the heat and stir through the milk, then taste for seasoning. Ladle into bowls and drizzle over a little extra oil, then top with a few wild garlic flowers, if you have them.