Beet and Cauliflower Soup

This soup has amazing color to it and is really tasty. Its a puree soup so you can choose how blended you actually want to have it be perfectly smooth or a little chunky.
Ingredients needed:
Olive oil
1 large onion
3 cloves garlic
1 medium cauliflower head
4 medium to large beets
½ teaspoon sugar
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
5 cups broth (about...enough to cover the veggies)
1½ cup milk
Salt and pepper to taste

Sour cream
Fresh dill

*First step should really be to just get everything (beets, cauliflower, onion, garlic) chopped up into chunks that are about an inch (maybe a little smaller) and set the beet and cauliflower to the side
*Take the chopped onion and garlic and put them in the pan with enough oil to sautee it and turn on the heat to medium. Cook it until the onion begins to become transparent.
*Add in the cayenne and sugar and saute while stirring for about two minutes.
*Add the beets and cauliflower to the pan and add enough broth to cover them. Bring it to a simmer. Keep it at a low boil for 20-30 minutes, basically until the beets get tender enough to be poked through with a fork.
*Once it is cooked take it off the heat and let it cool for about 5 minutes until you can use an immersion blender safely inside the pan.
*If you want it to be a little chunkier I would suggest taking out a couple of ladle-fulls of the whole veggies and set them aside. Blend what is left until it is smooth. **If you want it to be only a little chunky, then when it seems to be about halfway to smooth add in the reserved pieces. Basically when you put the reserved stuff in depends on how chunky you want it to get.
*Once it is the consistency that you want, start adding the milk, salt and pepper to it as well as . You may want more or less, depending on how thick you want the ending soup to be.
*If you feel the need to reheat it, you can do that, but it should still be warm enough to simply serve. Put it into bowls and add a dollop of sour cream and some fresh chopped dill to the top and its ready to eat!

Red Root Soup

I made this soup because all things root and tuber seem to be plentiful here in Finland and they are really delicious! This is super simple and I think turned out really well. I actually really liked the color of the broth that is mostly due to the beets. The recipe is really simple and doesn't require specific measurements of the ingredients and can be altered if you have more of one thing or another or just prefer the flavor or texture of one thing versus another.

     Basic ingredients list:

• Onion
• Garlic
• Olive oil
• Stock/Water/Stockcube
• Oregano
• Bay Leaf
• Salt
• Pepper
• Potatoes
• Beets
• Carrots
• Parsnips
• Celery
• Crushed tomato

First thing that needs to be done is that the onions and garlic need to be chopped up and sautéed until clear in the olive oil at the bottom of the pan that you are going to cook this all in. This gets the flavor of the onion out and into the oil rather than just boiling off into the water. After that is done, add the hardest vegetables in (the potatoes and the beets) as they will have to cook the longest along with the spices to the pan and add enough water or stock to cover them. The potatoes don't actually need quite as much time as the beets do to be done, but cooking them a little past that lets them melt a bit into the soup. Once those are part way done (should be 10-15 minutes but will depend on the size of the chunks you cut the veggies in) add the rest of the ingredients and cook until everything is done. Super simple and very yummy! This is a healthy and versatile soup that could be changed based on preferences and what you happen to be able to get your hands on.