New Recipe - Celery and Lemon Soup

I tried a new recipe today.  You soften some celery and finely chopped onion, add stock and the juice and grated rind of a lemon and simmer until soft.  In a separate pan make a roux of flour and butter, add three quarters of a pint of milk very slowly until thick, then mix into the blended celery and onion in broth mix.  Then you beat up two egg yolks with three tablespoons of cream and then mix a ladleful of soup into the cream-and-egg-yolks and return to the pan.  The recipe was very insistent that you did not boil after this stage, so we didn't (DH was an equal partner in this).

I loved it.  DH loved it.  Bear asked for tinned ravioli as he didn't like the lemon.

It was the first time that I had used egg yolks to thicken a soup.  I had always been very nervous.  However it worked.  I may take a few more risks in future, obviously bear permitting.

It is a recipe from the first cook book I bought - Good Food on a Budget by Georgina Horley.  It is very dated.  The link goes to one published in 1969, though mine was around the 1988 vintage.  The Christmas cake recipe from there is awesome, and much recommended.

I love this cookbook.  The recipes are good, and all the ones I have tried have worked.  However the reason I keep coming back to it is that I love the way it is written and the down to earh discussion of the recipes.  It is someone who has tested each recipe to its limit, and I love the comments.  The recipes are unusual as well.

I am still feeling low, so I am working extra hard to avoid random shopping.  There is a type of compost made of wool and bracken.  I am working hard not to look at that, as it sounds awesome but the shipping would be prohibitive.  I shall scour the free ebooks instead.