Creamy Leek & Potato Soup

Ingredients

• 500g potatoes, peeled and diced
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 3 large leeks, sliced (white and pale green parts only)
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 1 litre hot vegetable stock
• 100ml double cream, to finish
• 25g butter
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 10g chives, finely snipped
• 1 small crusty sourdough bread loaf, to serve

Method

1. Melt the butter with the olive oil in a heavy pot over a medium-low heat. Add the sliced leeks and chopped onion with a generous pinch of salt — the salt pulls the moisture out and stops them catching. Sweat gently for 8–10 minutes until very soft, glossy and just collapsing. You're not after colour here; brown leeks turn the finished soup grey and bitter.
2. Stir in the crushed garlic and cook for 30 seconds, just until fragrant — no more. Burnt garlic turns the whole pot bitter and you can't pull it back out. Add the diced potatoes, cauliflower florets, white beans, bay leaf and dried thyme. Stir for a minute to coat everything in the buttery base.
3. Pour in the hot vegetable stock and bring to a gentle simmer. Cook for 15–18 minutes, uncovered, until a knife slips through the potato and cauliflower without any resistance. Anything less and the blended soup will be grainy.
4. Lift out the bay leaf. Blend with a stick blender straight in the pot — or in batches in a jug blender, lid cracked open and a tea towel over the top — until completely smooth and silky. Return to a low heat.
5. Stir in the double cream and warm through for 2–3 minutes; don't let it boil or the cream can split. The soup should coat the back of a spoon and leave a clean line when you draw a finger through it. Taste, season, taste again — plenty of salt and black pepper. Adjust now, not at the table.
6. Ladle into warmed bowls. Scatter the snipped chives generously over each one, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and finish with a fresh crack of black pepper. Tear the crusty bread at the table for mopping.