Maybe one of your new year’s resolution has been to eat a little healthier and/or look after yourself in a kinder way. I definitely am going to continue exploring how I can keep my cooking healthy, wholesome, yummy and fun.

The first handful of people I communicated with this year all asked me to share more recipes on this blog, some even urging me to post a daily picture of what’s going on in my kitchen or galley. Although I love cooking, mixing, blending, raw, ayurvedically and, yes, admittedly a  bit crazily at times – as long as none of my ingredients has had a mum or a dad in its life, if you know what I mean – I think my daily meal plan could become a bit boring with time due to its frequent simplicity. The less food is processed, the more its natural taste stands out. But sometimes I can be cheeky and tweak exactly that, trying to hide an ingredient’s natural taste, like in my all-time favourite avocado chocolate mousse.

Still, I will happily share a few highlights which have brightened up these cold, grey and long but also cozy, sweet and warm English afternoons as of lately. Often I start with a very traditional recipe, be it Italian, Greek, Asian, South American or other, and see how I can twist some ingredients to replace things like sugar, gluten or processed stuff with something more wholesome and good for us. Whatever I do, I pour in loads of love.

A week ago, this hearty warming earthy soup which was created more or less accidentally between nappy changes, painting trains, bathing the kids, waiting for hubby to pick up his lost (then luckily found again) credit card an hour north in Salisbury and packing our bags again. I used whatever was left in the fridge and we were all very pleasantly surprised by the outcome.

Moreover, my little one has been teething and given that they say orange food helps with this, another great reason to devour this soup. Also, if you’ve been flying too high into the new year with your mind racing over a thousand things a minute, this might help you to get more grounded and reconnect with your root chakra, Mooladhara. What you need (or do the same as I and just use what’s lying around, or even better, what your garden has to offer, and be creative):

1 sweet potato 1 potato 2 turnips 2 carrots 1 onion 4 cloves of garlic Bunch of spring onions Spanish sweet powdered red paprika and/or Italian herb mix Veggie broth, apprx 1 l 2 tbspTahini 1 tbsp sesame seeds Ghee Olive oil

Start by chopping the onion into small pieces as you warm up the ghee in a big saucepan at low heat. Add onions together with a dollop of olive oil. Chop and add the white parts of the spring onions and garlic cloves. Cover and let caramelize at low heat for twenty minutes or more. The lower the heat and the longer you give it, the more time you allow for the natural sugar to feature in your soup. Once you’ve chopped all other ingredients, add and stir, together with a tea spoon of the sweet paprika powder and the herbs, if available. Add your broth and simmer until vegetables are tender. Then add two table spoons of tahini and one heaped one of sesame seeds. Turn the heat of. Stir. Add the chopped green parts of the spring onions and serve.

Because my husband is a hard one to fill up with soup, and because I had some leftovers from the day before, I also added some brown rice and quinoa mix to every bowl of soup. Talking about which, this must be one of the best marriages there is. A very dear friend of mine keeps on encouraging me to share more of my creative kitchen spaces with her, facebook and the rest of the world. She thinks I’m a fantastic cook and I think the same of her. In fact, this simple combination came from her cooking and has ever since become part of our staples. Rice alone can be a bit boring. Quinoa alone can be a bit too grainy. Both together simply rock – and so do Mauritian sisters!