Salmon and Brown Rice Soup
Comforting, wholesome, heart-warming bowl food – that is what this dish is about. It is unfussy, easy and pretty good for you – no washing up and ready within 20 minutes. We love this sort of cooking, a pot bubbling away on the stove while you potter about at the end of a long day before curling up in the arm chair with a decent glass of red wine and putting on a movie. It is feel good food. Food to nourish you from inside out. The concept of bowl food is a lovely one, Georgina Hayen’s book Stirring slowly is dedicated to it. The book celebrates foods power to restore, revive and rejuvenate and the process of cooking, as much as the eating. It is nice to think that comfort food doesn’t have to be a burger or a 4 cheese pizza but it can be good for you. You don’t have to feel guilty, you can sit back and fully enjoy every moment. Meals should be that way, we all live pretty hectic lives in London, rushing around from meeting to meeting, being squished on the tube or nervously waiting in terrible traffic, grabbing a sandwich if we have time and eating on the go. To be able to come home and have a moment to yourself, to shut out the noise of beeping taxis and to switch off before bed with a delicious bowl of something warming – nothing is more important for this. If you can achieve this then you are well on the way to a happy, balanced life. This dish is a good one for kids too, a decent weeknight dinner and don’t feel that you need to add the egg, it is just as good without. If you are unsure on making a good poached egg then you can just make a soft-boiled egg and peel it – a safer option.