Sunday 29 April 2007

Easy Peasy


It’s getting cold in Sydney. I know this because I’ve started wearing a scarf this week. I’ve also noticed that I am craving soups for lunch. Not the watery-type clear soups, but that more hearty and substantial soup which you can have as a meal. Of course the plus point is that these soups tend to be healthy too. I made this soup for Quikong for the first time two weeks ago when he was feeling under the weather, and it got his approval. He even had a second helping!

I made this yesterday for lunch and plan to freeze the rest of it for a quick and easy lunch at work. Making this is super easy. The only “hard” bit is chopping everything up and waiting for it to be ready. It’s high in protein and fibre. Pair it with a couple of slices of crusty bread and it becomes a very healthy and hearty meal.

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Easy Peasy Autumn Veggie Soup
(serves 4-6. I suggest making double of this recipe and freezing it )

250g of a mix of your choice of: pearl barley, lentils (red spilt, whole green), peas (yellow, green, red), beans (white, black eye, red, faba, pinto); rinsed
1.5 L stock (veggie or chicken)*
2 celery stalks, sliced
2 large carrots, diced
200g pumpkin, diced
1 onion, diced
2-3 cloves of garlic, chopped
freshly ground black pepper (or 2 small dried chillies finely sliced )
Optional: 1 tspn of your favourite dried herb

(*or 1.5 L water with 2 heaped tbspn of powered stock)

Place all the ingredients in a large heavy based pot, bring to the boil and simmer for an hour, or longer (till the beans and pear barley are tender). Stir occasionally. The lentils and pumpkin would have disintegrated into the soup by now. Add more boiling water if the soup gets too thick. You may also need to add salt to taste.
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Variations:
(a) add 1 small can of chopped tomatoes (reduce water to 1.25L) and a few tspns of curry powder. Then serve with pappadums.
(b) add chicken, potatoes and a tspn of dried rosemary
(c) crumble some feta cheese just before serving
(d) add ½ cup of brown rice and a extra cup of water/stock

Source: Own creation


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Taster Notes by Quikong


All I recall is having a second helping, so it must have been pretty good!

(Nora: His comment is based on the same soup that I made last fortnight.)

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4 comments:

Janet said...

Hi Nora - that looks delicious. I will have to try that - soup is one of only ways to trick my kids into eating veggies! One of these days I'll have to post my Mom's Newfoundland Pea Soup recipe, your picture reminded me of that.

Nora B. said...

Hi Janet, I'm looking forward to reading about your Mom's Newfoundland pea soup - it's interesting to see what types of ingredients go into regional recipes.

Eva said...

Although today is a very warm and sunny day, I'm already in the soup mode, too! And there's no need for all the soaking business ahead of time - very good! BTW, nice square plate!

Anonymous said...

Perfect! That's exactly the kind of soup recipe I was looking for.
I LOVE barley and this will be a great winter soup. Thanks!