This is a quick and easy recipe that doesn't require too much preparation, nor a lengthy cooking time, but results in a delicious and unusual soup. You can use ordinary white 'shop mushrooms' or experiment with something different. I used ceps and they produced a very nice soup.
I haven't specified what kind of blue cheese to use as your choice might be limited to whatever kind with vegetarian rennet your local shop stocks. A hard crumbly cheese is preferable - Gorgonzola, Stilton or something like that. Whatever kind you choose, keep it in the fridge until needed and towards the end of cooking time, crumble it up ready for adding to the soup. Depending on the type of cheese you bought and it's consistency, this may require various approaches. I found that stabbing away at the cheese with a fork did the trick.
The quantities are enough for two or three people.
150-200g of mushrooms
300-350g of spinach
1 small onion
1 or 2 cloves of garlic
A little black pepper
1 tomato
50-60g of blue cheese
1 veggie stock cube
Salt
Olive oil
1 litre of hot water
Chop the onion and fry gently in olive oil. Finely chop the garlic and slice the mushrooms and add to the pan when the onion has started to brown. The garlic and mushrooms just need frying for a minute, so you can roughly chop the spinach and tomato and add it to the pan straight away. Cover the pan and cook until the spinach is limp, then add a litre of hot water, the stock and black pepper and simmer for about eight to ten minutes. When the soup is ready, turn off the heat and stir in the crumbled cheese.
This is a soup that goes very well with croutons.