The last 7 days have been the toughest in my life. On Wednesday 18th March my Dad finally gave up his fight against Dementia and peacefully passed away, at home, with all his family and friends around him. He was diagnosed with Vascular Dementia in 2014 and after a slow decline over the years he seemed to fall off a cliff in 2019. I was lucky enough to be able to join forces with my Mam and care for him at home 24/7 for the last 6 months of his life and I was holding his hand as he slipped away. I have a whole mix of emotions of course and have a sense of relief that his struggle is over and I would like to thank his GP and all the amazing District Nurses who helped us and Dad in the final days. That will never be forgotten. We’ll also never forget the kindness of friends and family who stayed by our side and kept us going with food and cakes and made us laugh.

Due to the worsening situation with the COVID-19 pandemic and with my Mam being over 70, we’ve found ourselves in self isolation. Very scary and confusing times for us all. We are doing what we can to pick ourselves up and stay positive and I had an idea to FINALLY learn how to make soup!!

My Mam has been making soup in the same way since she learned from my Dad’s mother over 50 year ago… and still uses the SAME PAN as my Grandma did. This soup… I’ve always called “soup-de-loop”, has been a staple in our family but especially in winter and when one of us was under the weather. Comfort food at it’s finest! It was also Mother’s Day so it was lovely to do something together and I now have the recipe, It’s very simple but it means a lot to me as you can imagine.

Soup-de Loop

Ingredients

• Gammon joint or ham shank
• 300g red split lentils
• 4 carrots
• half a turnip
• 1 large leek

Step 1

Get out THE PAN pop in lentils and joint and fill with cold water to cover the joint. Bring to the boil and simmer for 2 hours

Do not let it boil over!!

Step 2

Grate the carrots and turnip and slice the leek

Remove the ham and add the veg.

Add more water (2 inches from the top)

Stir and bring to the boil and simmer for 1 hour.

Do not let boil over!!

Step 3

Chop the ham and add to the soup. and stir

Step 4 (unexpected bonus!!)

Receive delivery of freshly made bread! Thank you so much Ann!

Step 5

Ladle amount needed into a smaller pan… warm… serve and enjoy!

It’s super easy and only cost about £5 for about 8 generous portions, so very easy on the pocket too!

Thank you for reading and much love to you all at this stressful time.

Karen xx