Watercress Bisque

"When I was a little girl we used to get watercress fresh from a running creek. It was a real treat. These days I have to buy it at the supermarket, but I still love its delicate flavour. I first tried Watercress Bisque when I was a member of a 'dining out' club. This is adapted from the recipe provided by the restaurant."
 
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photo by a food.com user photo by a food.com user
Ready In:
55mins
Ingredients:
11
Serves:
6
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ingredients

  • 2 bunches watercress (about 300g weight)
  • 50 g butter
  • 4 medium potatoes, peeled and chopped
  • 2 medium onions, peeled and chopped
  • 14 teaspoon salt
  • 1 14 liters vegetable stock or 1 1/4 liters chicken stock
  • 300 g cream
  • 34 cup ground almonds
  • 1 -2 teaspoon lemon juice (to taste)
  • 12 - 1 teaspoon salt, extra (to taste)
  • 1 pinch white pepper (or to taste)
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directions

  • Chop off and discard the lower third of the bunches of watercress.
  • Pick through the watercress, discarding any obviously woody stems.
  • Chop watercress roughly, and, if desired, reserve some sprigs for garnish.
  • Melt butter in a large saucepan over a medium heat.
  • Add potatoes, onions and watercress and stir well until vegetables are well coated in the butter.
  • Sprinkle vegetables lightly with salt.
  • Reduce heat to very low and cover vegetables with a piece of baking paper, foil or similar, tucking it in at the edges.
  • Sweat the vegetables over a very low heat for about 20 minutes, stirring and then re-covering, about half way through.
  • Add stock, increase heat and bring to a gentle boil.
  • Decrease heat and simmer for 15 minutes.
  • Puree in batches in a blender or food processor.
  • (The stems may prove a problem for a stick mixer).
  • Return soup to pan and add cream and ground almonds and lemon juice, white pepper and salt to taste.
  • Reheat to serve.
  • Serve garnished with sprigs of watercress OR float a young nasturtium leaf and flower on the top of each bowl.

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Reviews

  1. Awesome! I love watercress and was so happy to find another way to eat it. Yummy! BTW, I used soy milk instead of cream and it worked really well.
     
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Tweaks

  1. Awesome! I love watercress and was so happy to find another way to eat it. Yummy! BTW, I used soy milk instead of cream and it worked really well.
     

RECIPE SUBMITTED BY

<p>Above: Slideshow of our garden at Avalon Slideshow of our recent holiday at Woodgate Beach, South-East Queensland, Australia. Hi! I'm Kookaburra, from Australia. First, a promise. I will only post recipes on this site which I've made myself and to which I would personally give a 5 star rating - what you give them is up to you ;-) I look forward to receiving your feedback. If you look at my reviews, they're all 5 stars. That doesn't mean I give 5 stars to every recipe I try. I'm just not interested in giving poor ratings to anyone else's recipe because I accept that different people have different tastes. So, I've decided that I'll only review those recipes which I really love and which I'd make again and recommend to friends. If a recipe meets that criteria - even if it needs a bit of 'tweaking' to match my tastes, I'll give it 5 stars. If not, I'll just delete it from my recipe book and no hard feelings. I'm not advocating this as the 'right' approach. I just decided I needed a consistent strategy for rating and this is mine. I'm passionate about cooking - and eating! What I look for in food is something that 'zings' in the mouth. I like lots of taste - I'm not a big fan of subtlety. I don't often cook recipes exactly as written. I like to experiment and adapt things to my own taste. A retired marketing executive and academic, I live with my elderly (but thoroughly modern) mother in a tiny mountain village at the edge of the rainforest. I'm female, happily single, in my mid-40s and boast the Rubenesque figure of a passionate cook! Avalon, our 'story-book' cottage, overlooks a small lake. As I sit at my computer or work in the kitchen, I'm serenaded by a cacophany of native birds - including a very fat family of kookaburras! We have quite a large property and are lucky to have vegetable gardens and a variety of fruit and nut trees. I look forward to sharing recipes on Recipezaar with family, friends and friends I've yet to meet. last minute flight</p>
 
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