Recipe: Sweet Potato Soup with Wensleydale and Cranberry Toasts

This is a bit of an unusual lunch i made for myself yesterday- we've got a load of things to use up in the fridge before we go on holiday so i've been coming up with strange combinations. Actually I find that often a delicious recipe is discovered just due to the fact that there wasn't much in the fridge/cupboards and you just sort of "made something up". I still have loadddds of wensleydale with cranberries though, my boyfriend's brother gave us a huge chunk of it after he had a party. Thinking of maybe stuffing it into chicken breasts or something? Or maybe on a tart? Hurmmmm..... any way, I would fully reccomend trying out this unusual flavour combination, it really works!! By the way, i garnished the soup with some extra virgin olive oil and a pinch of cumin seeds, but that was really just for presentation purposes.

Sweet Potato Soup with Wensleydale and cranberry toasts (serves 3)

1 tbsp olive oil
Knob of butter
1 large red onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 celery sticks, diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
1 tsp garam masala
1 bay leaf
1 large sweet potato, peeled and diced
1 apple, peeled cored and diced
1 litre vegetable stock
Splash of milk (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste

3 large slices tiger bread
100g Wensleydale with cranberries

1. In a large saucepan, fry the onions, garlic and celery in the olive oil and butter for 10 minutes. Add the garam masala and bay leaf and cook for a further minute.
2.Add all the other ingredients (except the milk) and cook on a medium/high heat for 25 minutes. Blend (either in the pan with a hand blender, or in a liquidiser), season to taste, and add some milk if necessary to get the desired texture.
3.Meanwhile, toast the slices of tiger bread in a toaster. Heat a grill on to high, top the toast generously with the Wensleydale and put under the grill for a couple of minutes, or until beginning to brown. Serve with the soup.