Time for Turmeric

On Remembrance Sunday I had a slight lie in after an evening of celebration, cake and Fifa 2013 in honour of the birth of my friends' daughter the night before. Then after a walking my hyperactive Lakeland Terrier I remembered I had bought a jar of Turmeric during the working week and decided it was time to put it to good use in my cooking.

Turmeric is a bright orange colour normally and looks more like something you would use in a school science project rather than an ingredient to use in cooking. It has a spicy flavour all its own however and adds a special dimension to any dish it is added to.

I used it this time round in a soup of chickpeas with spinach. The soundtrack for the cookery was Queen's 1977 release News of the World. The album is known for being front loaded with the one-two punch of We Will Rock You and We Are the Champions however there is much more to it as the third song Sheer Heart Attack would not have sounded out of place on a Sex Pistols or Clash album and the seventh song Get Down Make Love was subsequently covered by Nine Inch Nails. The album as a whole shows that there is much more to the Queen than just Bohemian Rhapsody and It's a Kind of Magic.

I put three tablespoons of olive oil into the bottom of my Le Cresceut dish and moved the dish from side to side so that the oil covered the bottom of the dish. I turned the heat up on the hob and poured a teaspoon of coriander seeds, three diced cloves of garlic, two diced onions and half a teaspoon of fresh coriander into the dish. After I had mixed these ingredients together I added a teaspoon of Turmeric which gave the food an almost radioactive glow as I stirred the Turmeric into it.

After frying the ingredients on a low heat for about ten minutes, always making sure that I stirred them periodically to avoid them sticking to the bottom of the pan, I added four ounces of chopped spinach, the juice of half a lemon, four tomatoes with the tops removed, a can of chickpeas and a pint of chicken stock. I then covered the Le Cresceut with the lid and left the dish to simmer for around half an hour.

After the half hour was up I added a hint of black pepper and blended the ingredients on the lowest setting that my blender had. I then re-served it in the Le Cresceut dish after warming it through on the hob for about five minutes.

After blending the soup it looked a dark colour not dissimilar in fact to the colour of khaki warn by soldiers in the Second World War. The taste was excellent with the chickpeas and spinach providing an earthy taste which contrasted well with the sour taste of the lemon and the powerful flavour of the Turmeric.

Halfway through eating- an earthy soup brought to life by the strong taste of Turmeric and Lemon