Winter Weekend Warmer: Carrot Coconut Curry Soup

SD is down for a few weeknights this week so I want to do something simple and warm for us to enjoy after work. I was thinking about this at his over the weekend and was not very inspired. He cooked a delish Spaghetti Bolognese (For my non-UK readers that is just a regular tomato and meat sauce) so I didn?t want to do pasta or chilli for us. I also wanted to save a bit and use what I had in the house. I never have meat in the house though and it seems just a bit wrong to give a hungry fella a meatless meal.

Then he came out with the following: ?You know me. I?ll eat anything. I?d be happy with soup?

Hot. Damn. He knows how to turn me on.
I am not a veggie. I do eat meat and animal products but meat is an expense that I can do with out for myself. Especially since I will buy the more costly free range option when I do go for it. So I have got some pretty good veggie options in my repertoire.

One of them being soup.

Soup is another one of those black magic concoctions that I don?t use a recipe for. Whatever is around that needs to be used up goes in and what comes out tends to taste pretty darn good. Serve it up with some crusty bread and a good cheese and it is a hearty meal for all its meatlessness.

This is what I would call a creamed soup (as opposed to cream or clear). Everything gets cooked together in one pot and then the hand blender is applied. There is no actual cream in it but it comes out lovely and smooth.

The Ingredients
Please bear in mind that all measurements here are approximate. I don?t ever measure anything when making soup. Use what you think will taste good to you. I am trying to impart a general method for making a creamed soup.

5 or 6 large carrots roughly chopped
1 large onion roughly chopped
1 tbsp garlic puree
1 tbsp ginger root puree
1 tbsp tandoori masala*
1-2 tsp madras masala
1 tsp coriander powder
1-2 tbsp olive oil
1 pint coconut milk made from coconut milk powder**
½ pint chicken stock made from stock powder
1-2 tbsp nam pla***

The Tools
1 large pot
1 large spoon (for stirring and sautéing)
1 knife (for chopping)
1 chopping board (for chopping)
1 hand blender (AKA stick blender)*****
Spoons for spices and seasonings

The Method
1. Put your pot on a medium heat
2. When the pot is hot add your olive oil
3. After a minute add the spices, garlic, and ginger
4. After another minute add the chopped onion and sauté for about 5 minutes. Until it starts to get soft
5. Once the onion is soft add your carrots and sauté for another 5 minutes
6. Add the coconut milk, stock, and nam pla
7. Turn up the heat to bring to the boil
8. When it reaches a boil turn right down to the lowest heat and simmer
9. Taste the broth and adjust flavourings and salt
10. Simmer until the carrots are quite soft (about 45 minutes)
11. Taste again and adjust seasoning if needed
12. Take off the heat and puree with the hand blender
13. Taste yet again and adjust if required
14. Cool thoroughly*****
15. Refrigerate

The Plan
Between 1-3 days before your guest arrives. Or even more as this soup freezes very well

1.Prepare the soup up to step 15.

On the day your guest arrives

2.Pick up a nice crusty loaf or baguette and some favourite cheese

An hour before your guest arrives

3. Cut the loaf and bring the cheese out in time to make sure it is at room temperature before serving

When your guest arrives

4. Put the chilled soup on a low-ish heat

When the soup is hot

5. Serve the soup in bowls with the loaf and cheese on the table so your guest can help themselves

Recommendations

This is my take on a creamed soup. You can use whatever main ingredient you like or have to hand. This would be quite yummy made the same way with any root veg like turnips or parsnips. They are robust and have a low water content so the soup will come out thick without having to add a thickener like corn starch or a high fat cream. You would also be successful with broccoli if and you can bring yourself to eat such a thing.

Steer clear of veg that have a high water content like celery or fennel or even cauliflower. These can be used in this soup (a couple of celery sticks will add a great flavour) but should not be the main ingredient. These veg are more suited to a cream soup. A soup that is still cooked all in one and pureed but has cream or other thickener added to give it some body. These will still turn out much thinner than this carrot soup and are better as starters rather than as a main course.

As I said at the beginning my soup pot is more a witch?s cauldron. There are certain flavours that are good together and it is just through cooking a lot of soup that these combinations become evident.

*masala (tandoori or otherwise): A masala is a combination spices (either in a dry powder or paste) and other seasonings such as garlic, ginger, onions, tomato. They are used in Indian cooking. To over simplify a masala is curry powder. I do not have an Indian or Asian background but for the last nine or so years have lived in a country where there is a large segment of the population who has. As you would expect the exposure to this culture and the availability of ingredients greatly influences my own cooking.

**coconut milk powder: This is another eastern and southern Asian ingredient that I now use quite a lot in my soups and curries. You can use plain old milk instead. Or even plain old water if you want to save calories. In this recipe it is simply used for flavour. The soup will be thick enough with out it.

***nam pla: Thai fish sauce. I love this stuff and use to season just about anything instead of salt. You can use soy sauce or anchovy or even just sea salt instead.

**** hand/stick blender: Not big on kitchen gadgets but this one does the creamed soup to perfection. I have not been able to get results as good with a food processor or sieve but these can be used instead. Just make sure your soup is cold before putting into the processor

***** You can serve this soup immediately but if you leave it a day or two in the fridge the flavour will be much better. This is because through heating and cooling and heating again the flavours are ?tempered?.

Conclusions

I love cooking soup. It warms the house and makes it smell wonderful and homey. It is also CHEAP. It lets me use up what is in the house.

This meal will cost almost nothing to feed two people for two nights especially if I decide to make my own bread.

This also highlights the importance of having a fairly well stocked pantry.

It is important a goal of this project to make sure people know they can use what they have on hand rather than getting something specific in but if they have NOTHING on hand or lack what I would consider to be essential items then any cooking is going to be difficult.

It may take a little initial up front investment but the fun you can have once you are all set up is priceless.