Warm up this Winter with Heinz Soup

Fight the freeze with some warming soup

As winter sets in, commuters across the UK are being given a warming surprise after ‘Break In Case Of Emergency’ cases, containing a free can of the nation’s favourite Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup, were placed across cities. Throughout soup season, Heinz will be popping up in the coldest cities and towns across the UK, so keep your eyes peeled for one of the cases to get yourself a can of soup. Who said there was no such thing as a free lunch?!

The emergency soup boxes have been created following research that found that 75% of Brits agree that nothing beats a winter chill like a hot bowl of soup. According to figures, the north is the biggest soup 'hot spot' during the winter months, with Londoners' love of soup making the city come a close second. It is estimated that Heinz will sell over 20 million cans of soup this January, keeping the nation warm, comforted and cosy in the cold weather. 

Soup consumption increases by 65% from summer to the winter months, with demand increasing with every degree the temperature drops.  Soup is definitely the ultimate comfort food to keep us going when the weather is miserable and Heinz canned soups are so convenient to keep in the cupboard for a quick and easy bowl of warming soup to keep the cold at bay.

Top 5 facts about the nation’s favourite soup:

• Approximately 1,600 cans of Heinz soup are made every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year
• Heinz sells more than 65 million cans of Cream of Tomato soup a year, equating to 124 cans per minute
• More UK households buy Heinz soup than lightbulbs
• Heinz tasters take samples of soup from the end of the lines every hour to ensure it looks and tastes exactly right
• Heinz uses specially selected ingredients to make its soup – every tomato is sun-ripened and grown in open fields
• A can of Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup counts as 1 of your 5 a day

Delicious Cheese & Vegetable Bake Recipe with Cathedral City #CheeseRules #LoveCheese

Love Cheese? Welcome to the Club!

Cathedral City, the nation's favourite Cheddar, has recently undergone a relaunch with brand new packaging and a new advertising campaign starring David Jason, based on those unwritten rules of cheese that Cathedral City fans will totally relate to. Cathedral City's distinctive, smooth creamy Cheddar is made using milk from dedicated West Country farmers in their Cornish creamery, making it the perfect cheese for cheese lovers, however they enjoy it.

From watching bubbling cheese in the oven, to eating that last awkwardly shaped bit of cheese when grating, to nibbling the crispy edge bits on a freshly baked lasagne to making multiple visits to the cheeseboard at a party - these are all habits that cheese lovers find irresistible. And with 66% of people surveyed by Cathedral City admitting to always having cheese in the house, there are lots of us who enjoy eating cheese in our own unique quirky way! 21% of people said they would choose cheese over social media, that sums up just how deep our nation's love affair with cheese really is.

I have to confess to being someone who finds it hard to go to the fridge without cutting a thin slither of cheese off the block to pop in my mouth. And those crispy bits that drip onto the grill pan when making cheese on toast are just too tasty to ignore. And the browned cheesy topping on a lasagne, a cheese topped shepherd's pie, nachos or enchiladas is just too delicious.  Italian dishes such as pizza and pasta have toppled curry as our new national favourite dish, thanks to their indulgent cheesiness.

My favourite cheese rule concerns cheese sauce. You can never put enough cheese into your cheese sauce, because the tastier the better! A rich, flavoursome cheese sauce makes any meal even more delicious. Just think of macaroni cheese or cauliflower cheese. Perfect comfort food.

What are your cheese rules? What do you find irresistible about Cathedral City Cheddar? I'd love you to leave a comment and share the cheese love!

In honour of the Cathedral City Cheese Rules, here is a recipe for a delicious family meal that includes a delicious mix of seasonal vegetables enrobed in a rich cheese sauce topped with Cheddar cheese and baked until golden brown.  One of the best things about this recipe is that you can adapt it to include any of your favourite vegetables, or to use up any veg left in the fridge if you are looking for a frugal meal time idea. A perfect dish for lovers of yummy cheese sauce.

Cheese & Vegetable Bake Recipe

with Cathedral City

Ingredients

1 leek

1 large potato

1 sweet potato

2 medium carrots

1 head of broccoli

6 white mushrooms

1 onion -sliced

4 asparagus stalks

2 cloves garlic - finely chopped

2 tablespoons of canned sweetcorn

1/2 vegetable stock cube

2 oz butter

2 oz plain flour

1 pint milk

4 oz Cathedral City Mature Cheddar (plus extra to taste!)

ground pepper

pinch of mixed herbs

2 oz Cathedral City Mature Cheddar grated

Method

Peel and chop the vegetables into bite size pieces, slice the onion and chop the garlic. Add the potato, onion and carrot to a pan of water with the stock cube added. Bring to boil and simmer for 5 minutes. Then add sweet potato and simmer for a further 5 minutes. Add asparagus, broccoli, mushroom, leek and garlic and simmer for a further five minutes until cooked through.

Meanwhile, make the cheese sauce. Melt the butter in a pan and stir through the flour. Cook gently whilst stirring for one minute then remove from heat and slowly whisk in the milk, a little at a time. Return to low heat and continuously stir until thickened. Add grated cheese, herbs and pepper and continue to stir until cheese is melted through.

Put the Vegetables into an ovenproof dish and add the sweetcorn. Pour over the sauce and top with more grated cheese.

Pop into the oven at 180 degrees centigrade and cook for about 25 minutes until bubbling and golden brown on top.

Perfect served with steamed cabbage for a wholesome, hearty and deliciously cheesy dinner that your cheese loving family will love. It's a great way to get vegetables into the diets of fussy eaters.

If you love cheese and want to join in with Cathedral City's passion for Cheddar, you can find Cathedral City on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/CathedralCity/ Here you can find a quiz to discover just what find of cheese lover you are from a passionate cheese lover to the ultimate cheese worshipper!

My January survival guide

These Atlantic storms that keep on battering Britain are bringing some terrible wintry weather our way.  It's grey, damp and chilly out there and the school run is proving to be a bit grim, especially when the threat of snow hangs over our heads.  I am consistently fearful that the heavens will open and dump their white stuff on the 3 miles of narrow, winding country roads I have to take to get Freddy to and from school.  It's a scary prospect, and I am forever grateful that I have winter tyres on my car. I am a bit of a worrier so I also keep a tealight and a box of matches in my glove compartment - apparently it can keep you warm if you get snowed in.  I also have a foil blanket and a supply of water (I've done that ever since watching Cujo!) so I am prepared for any unexpected blizzards.

With winter doing its worst to freeze us to the bone, one of the best things we can do is get out our woollies, wrap up warm and do our best to stay cosy in spite of the elements.  I love winter clothes. The bigger, the baggier the better! I have a big collection of oversized, chunky knit jumpers and I regularly 'borrow' something from Ian's collection of super cosy men's cardigans that are my defence against the winter months.  I like nothing more than to pull the woolly fabric around my body and feel like I am being enveloped in a big, warm hug.  My winter clothing colour scheme is a palette of greys, fawns, blacks and browns. (Not that much dissimilar to my summer wardrobe colour scheme if I'm very honest - I clearly have a very predictable attraction to dark and muted tones!)

Being thrifty, I am not one to leave the central heating on 24/7, in fact my older girls mock the fact that my house is sometimes a bit on the cool side.  They both live in flats that are always incredibly warm, anyone would think that they were cold blooded. Me, Ian and the two little ones are acclimatised to the temperature we maintain at home, but my big girls do moan about it. My mantra is 'if you're cold put on another woolly jumper and snuggle under a blanket'.  I think it's much nicer to get snuggly that way...and it doesn't cost any money!

Comfort food is a big part of coping with this season.  But the consequences of indulging in lots of stodgy, carb laden meals does not go well with the newly made annual resolution to eat healthier and lose weight.  To satisfy my desire for tucking into warming, comforting meals, whilst not breaking any resolutions, I make big, hearty stews with red lentils and root vegetables topped with wholemeal, seeded cobbler; homemade apple crumble sweetened with maple syrup and fortified with oats and smoky Quorn chilli packed with beans and veggies served with cauliflower rice.  They all taste seasonally delicious, while being totally nutritious.  Guilt free comfort.

In winter, it is good to get out and get some exercise, especially if the sun is making one of its rare appearances.  It is all too easy to stagnate at home and dream of hibernating, but to get some fresh air and blow away the cobwebs is really good for the soul.  All you need to do is wrap up warm, grab your wellies and head out for some family fun.  Going for a brisk walk out in the countryside is a great way to get the heart pumping.  Having a ramble in the woods or a play in the park is energetic, fun and free.  A great antidote to the excesses and lethargy of Christmas that gets the kids away from their new technological devices and gets me away from the left over Christmas chocolates.

We may complain about January and the wintry weather, but it definitely has its good points.  The new year gives us all the opportunity for a fresh start filled with optimism and determination. It's the month when all the good TV shows come back on, so I'm happily rewelcoming American Horror Story, Scandal, Broadchurch and the Undateables into my life. We get to buy next Christmas's presents, wrapping paper and decorations in the January sales, saving a load of cash and getting ourselves super prepared in advance. And, as previously mentioned, we get to legitimately enjoy wearing our snuggliest winter woollies and steal our husband's cosy cardies!


I have been compensated for writing this post but retain all editorial control.

Foodie Friday - Stew with Dumplings

One thing that I love about winter is making stews.  Good old vegetable stews with a dumpling or cobbler topping are just the perfect comfort food on these freezing cold December evenings.  I've been using my slow cooker which has made my life so much easier!  I bung in swede, carrot, onion, leek, sweet potato, potato and parsnip along with veggie stock, rosemary and ground pepper.  About half an hour before the end of the cooking time, I throw in some Quorn pieces.  Then I finish it off for 20 minutes in the oven with dumplings or cobbler. Yum!!