Another rainy day, leek and potato soup

It's raining harder today and everything is just soaking wet. It's cold and damp, and just plain miserable outside. But it's fine, it just means more soup!

The birds had their bath day today, I couldn't resist getting a picture of Kiwi afterwards:

Kevin has the wood stove going nice and warm to help dry them out!

Dale and I had a snuggle as we do each day.

Dale has decided I am her mate. This is common with PD's that have bonded more with their people. She tolerates the other four Prairie dogs we adopted almost a year ago but has not bonded with any of them and will not nest with them. So I need to replace her past mates as much as I can. I cannot magically become a Prairie dog, but I can give her as much cuddling as possible, which she gladly takes!

I continued to do laundry and just organize things for the winter. The entire house needs to adjust with the seasons here.

I got our new shower curtain up in our master bath that we bought in Michigan in the spring when we were visiting Kevin's son. He took us to the big Cabella's store there. I've been looking for one of these forever and they had just one left.

For dinner I made my absolute favorite potato leek soup, however for the first time ever, I added dumplings.

I found a couple recipes floating around online but decided to try my own. I used my go to potato leek soup recipe, which is simple and always works, and I used the dumpling recipe I use for chicken and dumplings.

Potato Leek soup

I use three large leeks, the white and palest green parts only. I slice the leeks in half and then slice them up. I then wash them to get all the grit out of them, leeks have lots of dirt inside the nooks and crannies.

I use about 2 tbs of butter in a large pot, toss in all the leeks and let them saute on medium heat for about 20 minutes.

Then add about 2 1/2 cups of diced potatoes to the leeks and enough vegetable stock to cover. Salt and pepper. Cook over medium low until potatoes are cooked.

Then I blend the soup using my hand blender and add 1/2 cup of milk. Salt and pepper to taste and the soup is done.

Now for the dumplings:

2 cups all purpose flour

3 tsp baking powder

1 tsp sea salt

1 tsp dried thyme

3 tablespoons butter, softened

3/4 cup milk

Mix together all the ingredients. Roll your dough out on a lightly floured surface, into a square about 6 inches by 6 inches.

Using a knife cut the dough into small squares. With your hand, lightly roll the squares, one at a time, into small balls and drop into the soup.

I used about half the dumplings in the picture above.

When all the dumplings you'd like are in the pot, cover and cook on low for 25 minutes. Do not lift lid.

This soup is easily on my top 5 favorite soup recipes. So warm and comforting.

Enjoy!

Now I'm off to have a cup of tea and enjoy my book...