Cold weather cooking: Pea soup two ways. #1 – Vegetarian

What’s nicer (don’t answer that!) than a warming bowl of pea soup in winter, especially the icy depth of winter we’re experiencing in Melbourne now with breezes alternating between antarctic (southerly) and alpine (northerly). I love soups like these because I can make them long before they’re due to be eaten, to reheat as soon as we come in from the frozen wastes.

My favourite vegetarian pea soup comes from The Hungry Tiger, a blog by a linguist, Redfox, who writes as fluently as she cooks.

Redfox’s Red Lentil Soup, she explains, was adapted from a book called Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. She says:

The method sounds a little fussy — cooking all those ingredients separately — but it really isn’t. You just need one pot going with your lentils while you do everything else in one frying pan on the next burner, and the timing is very forgiving. It makes enough for two, plus extra for one person’s lunch the next day.

RED LENTIL SOUP

1 c. red lentils
1 1/2 t. tumeric
1 smallish onion, diced
1 t. ground cumin
1-2 t. mustard seeds
2 T. butter
A couple of handfuls of greens appropriate to sautee-ing, chopped roughly; I used a mix of baby spinach and “asian mix” that were the tail ends of those prewashed bags from the market. [I use one bag of baby spinach or spinach-and-rocket from the supermarket, or a couple of handfuls of the same from the greengrocer. Baby bok choy or Kang Kong is also good. H]
juice of one lime and/or a couple of splashes of vinegar
salt

Put the lentils, a third of the butter, the tumeric, and a teaspoon of salt in a soup pot with 5 cups of water. Bring to a boil and then turn down to a simmer. Cover and let cook for about twenty minutes.

Meanwhile, take about half of the remaining butter and in it gently sautee the onion, the cumin, and the mustard seeds until soft.

When the lentils are done, you can leave them alone or puree them, which makes for a nice creamy smooth soup. It’s a nice touch, but it’s probably only worth it if you have an immersion blender. The point of this soup is to be deceptively simple, and it just won’t be if you have to pour hot liquids into your Osterizer and back again. Unless you like that sort of thing, in which case go crazy.

Add the onion mixture and the lime juice and/or vinegar. Taste and adjust seasoning. Then heat the remaining butter in your frying pan. When it gets foamy, add the greens. Sprinkle with salt and cook until they’re only just wilted.

Divide the greens between the bowls and ladle soup over top. If you like, add a little blob of yogurt (it’s good).

Now, if you look at my photo above and compare it with Redfox’s, you’ll see my red lentils turn yellow once they’re cooked, which must mean Australian red lentils are different to US red lentils. This doesn’t make it less delicious, though.

Here are some tweaks I have made, which make this easy recipe even easier.

-Instead of measuring a cup of lentils I just use one 375g packet. This is enough for about six greedy people, or for leftovers.

-I don’t measure the spices, just ad lib. I’ve found crushed coriander seeds are nice as well as/instead of the mustard seeds. Since this soup is so simple and cheap, you can play around to find what you like.

-I start by frying the onion and spices in the soup pot, then add water and lentils. Notice this saves a step. I don’t think it makes any difference to the finished soup.

As well as the dollop of yoghurt, I like to add a spoonful of Sambal Oelek (chilli sauce) as well. it’s pretty, isn’t it? I hadn’t been back to Redfox’s recipe for a while, so I’d cooked the greens into the soup at the last minute rather than adding them on top, but we quite like it that way. YMMV.

Since this soup became a household staple, I’ve been told by a couple of Sri Lankan friends that this is a Sri Lankan recipe. One of them varies the recipe by adding some tinned coconut milk. Unlike the pea and ham recipe I’ll post next, this soup can be eaten the same evening it’s made.