Week 20: Spinach Potato Soup + Beet Chocolate Cake

Cooking with Jane, Recipes, , ,

It’s chilly and the days are getting shorter, and all I want is soup and sweets. So this week I made an incredibly simple but hearty and delicious blended spinach soup, and a decadent and moist beetroot chocolate cake. If you’re into this kind of thing, you can easily fit these recipes into a Halloween themed meal – “ghoulish green soup”, and “bloody beet chocolate cake”. Not generally how I entice others to eat the food I make, but it could be fun!

More Magnificent Meal Musings:

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Spinach Potato Soup

Fast, simple, and delicious! Lots of different ways to flavour, but I kept it simple to enjoy the flavours of the potato and spinach.

Ingredients

  • 2 Tbsp butter or olive oil
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 4-5 small/medium potatoes, scrubbed, peeled, and roughly cubed
  • 4 cups chicken or veggie stock
  • 1 full bag spinach, roughly chopped
  • 1 tsp lemon juice
  • salt and ground black pepper to taste
  • optional spices: nutmeg OR paprika and cayenne
  • optional garnishes: yogurt or sour cream

Instructions

  1. Begin by sautéing the onions in a large pot in the butter or oil. Once translucent and softened, add the potatoes and stock. Bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer and let cook until potatoes are very tender, about 15 minutes.

  2. Add in spinach, and let cook until tender but still bright, about 1-2 minutes. Blend soup using an immersion blender or in batches in a regular blender. Blend until a smooth consistency is achieved. Add lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste.

  3. Serve hot with optional garnishes. Enjoy!

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Beet Chocolate Cake

This recipe comes form Martha Stewart. Instead of making a ganache for the top, I made a simple buttercream frosting and used the reserved beet water form boiling to make it a dusty rose pink colour. This cake is moist, decadent, and full of beets!

Ingredients

  • 3-4 beets peeled and cut into 2-inch chunks
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 cups sugar
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
  • Salt
  • 2 large eggs
  • 3/4 cup reserved beet water from boiling the beets
  • 1/4 cup neutral tasting oil
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Pink Buttercream Frosting

  • 1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
  • 1 cup icing sugar
  • 1-2 tsp reserved beet water

Instructions

  1. Cover beets with water in a pot. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer until very tender when pierced with the tip of a sharp paring knife, about 20 – 30 minutes. Drain, and save that beet water! It’s good for drinking, and I use a little bit to colour the buttercream frosting. Puree beets in a food processor until smooth.
  2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk together flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and 3/4 teaspoon salt in a large bowl. Whisk in eggs, water, oil, vanilla, and 1 1/4 cups beet puree (reserve remaining puree for another use).
  3. Grease a 9-inch round cake pan. Pour batter into pan. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire rack.
  4. Prepare buttercream by creaming butter and icing sugar. Add reserved beet water until desired consistency (I used only about 1 1/2 tsp).