I have been sick of paying so much money, for bad quality food, in my cantine these days...so as of Jan 1, I told myself that I would be bringing my own lunch from now on. I am proud to say that I have only bought a couple of slices of bread to eat with my soups that I've been brining...I think my tab for february is about 2 bucks! NICE!
Soup is SO cheap to make yourself...its keeps me full ALL afternoon and I'm satisfied with a really light dinner. And in the winter its so cozy to warm up a bowl of hearty soup...and with my bouts of strep throat this winter, its been just the ticket!
I have posted some soups before...I am going to go back and tag them as soup, so I can find all my soups, not just recipes. BUT, here is a fantastic lentil soup that I made...again from Martha. Sorry, but this lady KNOWS her soups!! I made adjustments to make what I thought would be a batch of 6 (it ended up being for 8), and here's my version on the 15 minute soup.
One of the things I love about the way my soup turned out is that it has some pop and crunch to it...make sure to cook the veggies and lentils JUST long enough so that they're barely cooked. Especially if you're going to cool, freeze and reheat like I do!
Lentil Soup
(makes 8 portions)
Ingredients
6 tsp extra-virg olive oil
3 white onions, finely chopped
6 carrots, finely chopped
6 celery stalks (AND GREENS!), finely chopped
8 garlic cloves, minced (could have used 10 here)
coarse salt and ground pepper
12 cups (3l) vegetable of chicken broth*
4,5 cups cooked (2 cups raw) lentils, rinsed and drained**
9 tsp red-wine vinegar
Directions
In a med saucepan, heat oil over medium. Add onion, carrot, celery and garlic; season with salt and pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, until onion softens, 3-5 min. I covered mine since it was so much in a large skillet. Add broth; bring to a boil and cook 5 min. Add lentils and cook 3 min. Stir in vinegar and season with salt and pepper.
*I didn't have any homemade on hand, so I used cubes of bullion...I made the brother WEAK as I wanted most of my flavor to come from the veggies I had labored over cutting up!!! There is TONS of flavor from the veggies, so use watered down stock if you want to.
**I used raw lentils because I wanted them firm. I used this basic guide...and check out the rest of the Culinate site, I came across this by chance and LOVE their site and recipes!
I ate a bowl as I wrote this and it turned out FANTASTIC!!!!!!!
ps. Check back next week for a black bean soup recipe...I'll try to pump 'er out next weekend! LOVE using one weekend day in the kitchen...really makes me feel 'at home'.
No comments:
Post a Comment