So often the answer is soup

This weekend I’m staying home, eating soup, and I couldn’t be happier. What are you up to? Nothing, I hope.

Roast fennel and red pepper soup.

As regular subscribers will know, on Saturdays I normally give you a single recipe around which you can build a whole meal. The idea is that you make one dish and then assemble everything else, as the French often do, from things you’ve bought. You might serve some charcuterie to start, then serve your roast chicken or casserole with some simple vegetables, followed by a green salad and some cheese, and perhaps a tart or some cakes bought from the patisserie. Everyone has a good time, no one remains a martyr in the kitchen, too exhausted to enjoy their guests. Faites simple.

I don’t know about you, but much as I love my family and friends, January is for us a quiet time. We seldom entertain. After brushing the final needles from the Christmas tree from their ingenious hiding spaces (the top of pictures? How?) and heroically finishing off the leftovers, we breathe out, read our Christmas books, watch films, go for walks, in an indolent, rolling timetable of soft pleasures.

But we have to eat and all of the Christmas chocolates are gone.