Carrot- Ginger- Miso Soup

When I made the Carrot-Ginger- Indian Spice soup, I said that I would circle back after trying a Carrot-Ginger-Miso soup that I had seen. And so I have.

I started with this recipe from Smitten Kitchen and changed it up a bit by looking at this from Chef's Blade, which was taken from the Candle Café Cookbook. And some of it (like the celery and lack of sesame) is because I just like it that way

(I actually think that celery, carrots, onions and garlic are the holy quartet, and should always be sauteed in olive oil together).

Carrot Ginger Miso Soup

olive oil

lots of Carrots (I used about 1.5 kg/3= lbs, cut in coins)

2 onions (diced)

6-8 stalks celery, diced.

3-4 cloves of garlic, sliced

lots of sliced, peeled ginger root (I used two thumbs worth)

red miso, 1/2 cup (or less to taste)

4-6 cups water

scallions to garnish

I heated the oil in a small stock pot, then sauteed the onions for 5 minutes, after which I added the garlic and sauteed. Then I added the carrots and celery and sauteed for another 10 minutes, stirring occassionally until softening up a bit. I added the ginger and salt and pepper (starting with 1 T salt/pepper) while sauteeing. Then I added the water (started with 4 cups) and covered the pot and let it simmer for 30 minutes, checking to see that the water was sufficient. If the carrots feel done at this point, pull out the stab-mixer and start pureeing. I needed to add 1 cup water while doing this. Then grab the miso (I started with 1/4 cup), mix it up with a fork in a bowl with a cup of hot water (I used the waterboiler) and add it to the soup and mix in. While tasting, I wound up adding 1/4 cup more (to make a total of 1/2 cup). Let it simmer a bit more, add salt and pepper to taste (it's probably salty enough from the miso) and serve with chopped scallions if you like.

Takes about 30 minutes total. You can use vegetable stock in addition to the water if desired (I was out). The spouse ate it all- he liked it more than I and I was eating the vegetarian chili while he was making his very happy way through this over the next several days. He votes this his favorite soup so far.

Cauliflower-Ginger-Potato Soup

Part of my goal of feeling healthier this year is, of course, eating healthier. I'm never going to be able to get a healthy can of soup off the shelf in Germany, but now that I can find natural and MSG-free stock, I'm going to be making a lot more soup. And since the kids are very happy just to have a quick chicken-noodle (while I'm not), I'll be experimenting more.

The last soup was a big hit with the German, myself, and Ian (who tells me that he has had an issue posting comments- if anyone else has, would you drop me a line at bigappletobigbear (at) googlemail.com so I can see if there's a general issue?). I'll be following up tomorrow with a miso version and will add it to that post, but yesterday I made Cauiflower-Ginger-Potato soup. I started off thinking I could make it parve again, but I'm afraid I went, ahem, too far with the cayenne pepper and wound up needing to add a liter of 2% milk to calm it down. The German says it's still a bit spicy, but good with the milk added.

I started with the allrecipes.com Creamy Cauliflower with Ginger soup and changed it up a bit.

Cauliflower-Ginger-Potato Soup

• olive oil (enough to simmer the vegetables)
• a head of cauliflower, roughly broken (I picked up organic and it was the best I have ever had- I may need to consider buying organic cauliflower deliberately in the future)
• turmeric (I didn't have fresh, but it's definitely better. Just wear plastic gloves when scraping it or know that you fingers will be dyed a rich golden color)
• cayenne pepper
• 4 cloves garlic, sliced
• onion, large dice
• thumb+'s worth of peeled and sliced fresh ginger root
• 2 blocks Knorr vegetable MSG-free bouillon
• 6 cups boiling water
• a bunch of garam masala (is any recipe with ginger not better with garam masala?)
• cayenne pepper to taste (don't do what I did- throw a bunch in)
• an extra potato or two, peeled and quartered (thrown in to calm the cayenne down in my case, but also making it smoother and thicker)
• 2/3-1 liter 2% milk (you can use whole if desired)
• salt and pepper to taste

Heat the oil in a stock/soup pot until it shimmers.

Then add the onions and sautee for 5 minutes.

Add turmeric and garam masala, to taste or a T+ each. Add cayenne pepper, but start with 1t and add more toward the end of cooking, when you can actually taste it.

Add cauliflower (and if you will use the potatoes, add them here as well)and continue to sautee 10 minutes.

Add garlic and ginger and sautee 2 minutes (add more oil if required).

Then add bouillon blocks and boiling water, stir, cover, bring to boil then lower to simmer for 20 minutes.

Use an immersion blender to puree the soup. Adjust spices. Add milk to taste and re-adjust spices, particularly salt and pepper.

The original recipe was 8 servings at 144 cal- this would be less: more (lower fat) milk, but more olive oil, 2x the fluid with far fewer calories. Our servings are more than a cup and we have more than 10.

Enjoy!

Carrot-Ginger-Indian Spice Soup

A general cover of the standard Carrot-Ginger soup seen on so many sites, thrown together with what I had in the house. Here's Epicurious, and Jamie Oliver (next time I'll throw in some fresh-ground nutmeg) and Cooks.com. Mine is closest to the first but is vegan and non-dairy. Low calories, low fat (just the oil used to sautee the veggies), extremely high flavor. Yum (although the picture I took- not so yum. Carrot soup through my lens- not so great.)

• 2lbs (approximately 4 cups) carrots, cut in coins
• 2-4 large onions, diced as large as you want
• 4-6 cloves garlic, sliced
• thumb's worth+ of fresh (peeled), chopped ginger root
  
• olive oil
• pepper and salt to taste
• T of yellow mustard seeds (didn't have)
• T of coriander seeds (didn't have)
• lots of garam masala (start with 3 T, add more to taste, contains mustard, coriander and cumin as well as other spices)
• cumin, if you have it
• organic lime, zested (3 tsp) and juiced (1-1/2 T)
• 5-6 cups boiling water/vegetable stock

My soup is far more spicy than the ones linked to above, but I like it that way. I also add some cayenne and more black pepper after it's in my bowl- the spouse likes it as above.

So, sautee the onions in oil, add garlic after 5 minutes. Add all the spices and sautee a bit more. Then add the carrots and toss with the hot oil with onions and garlic for a bit.

Add the 5 cups of water/vegetable stock. In this case I added the water and then two blocks of Knorr's new MSG-free/natural vegetable stock. I was pretty excited to find that Knorr has begun to use some of its natural/MSG-free formulation in Germany: they have always sold them in Italy, but Germany had the MSG-cheap stuff dumped here. (Germans are acknowledged throughout Europe- and in Germany- to be more concerned with quantity and price than with quality.)

Bring to a boil then simmer until it's all tender (I picked the kids up from school: an hour later it was done). Puree with a stab mixer and add more water if too thick. If too thin, could cook a bit more or add a few potatoes (but would have to either have boiled potatoes to hand or let them cook before eating the soup).

Add lime zest (reserve a tiny bit to sprinkle on serving) and lime juice. Stir. Salt and pepper t0 taste (add cayenne if you want).

Serve.

(You can add a dollop of yogurt or whatever, but I love that this is parve, neither meat nor milk.)