Spring Vegetable Soup

We worked most of the weekend at the farm, a welcome relief from the city. Between rain showers, we set about extending the garden bed, putting a few more seedlings into the ground, and securing the feral pea tendrils to their trellis. Everything is bursting through the surface just now, and it took a good deal of self-control to not eat the handful of snow peas I had popped into my basket.Midway through the day, a neighbor stopped by with a beautiful bouquet of asparagus from the bed at the back of his barn. We returned the favor, sending him home with a dozen fresh eggs. There’s a great conviviality to all things this time of year, as people shake off their cabin fever and reemerge into the agreeable sunshine.

After a long day outside, we lit a fire in the dining room and began making a meal from the handfuls of green things we had collected. I shelled fava beans over the sink and peeled the asparagus from our neighbor. The tender leaves of the season’s first spinach sat drying on towels, and my peas, I’m happy to report, also made it to the prep table. The evening’s meal was a beautiful bright green soup: simple, seasonal, and far more than the sum of its parts.

This soup is very adaptable, so don’t worry if you can’t get everything on the ingredients list. Use your own garden bounty or whatever’s at the local markets. Just be sure not to overcook the vegetables, as you want their unique flavors and textures to shine through.

For more stories, recipes, and home style tips from Krissy O’Shea, go to her blog, Cottage Farm (cottagefarmblog.com)