Your Chance to Make the Most Delicious Soup Ever
A while ago we got a nifty recipe for Apple Crisp from Megnut. Feeling very “pay it forward,” today, we offer this formula for The Best Thing We’ve Ever Done With Lentils. You’ll thank us later.
Unspeakably Fine Lentil Soup With Garam Masala and Chiles
(Adapted without any permission from James Peterson’s Vegetables. Maybe he’ll forgive us if you buy the book.)
Ingredients:
1 onion, minced
3 garlic cloves, minced
4 jalapeno chiles, seeded and minced
1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
3 tablespoons butter
2 cups water
2 cups chicken broth
1½ cups pink Indian lentils or Egyptian lentils
2 teaspoons Garam Masala
½ teaspoon ground turmeric
1 14-oz can light coconut milk
3 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
Juice of 2 limes
Salt and pepper to taste
In a large pot, heat the garlic in 2 tblsp. of the butter over very low heat for a few minutes. Add the onion, chiles, and ginger. Increase heat to medium and stir until onions are translucent and soft but not yet brown.
Add the lentils, broth, and water (you can replace the broth with water, but the broth does add a lovely flavor); cover and simmer over medium-low heat until the lentils are fully soft. Small red lentils should take 25-30 minutes.
In a separate, small pan heat the remaining butter with the Garam Masala and the turmeric over low-medium heat for 1-2 minutes, until you can smell the fragrance of the spices. Add the resulting spice-butter combination to the lentils, and stir in the coconut milk.
To puree, use a blender or food processor (we like the very convenient Braun Handblender); use a food mill or a strainer to get it even smoother if you want (here we pressed it through a strainer, which was laborious but worth it). Return it to the pot and simmer, stirring in the cilantro and lime juice and season to taste with salt and pepper.
Serve over basmati rice. Or by itself with some warm flatbread on the side.
You can serve this immediately -- but it’s even better after 24 hours in the refrigerator.
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If you like this recipe, you should get yourself a copy of Peterson's book, which is a capacious, thoughtfully assembled, easy-to-use, unpretentious, and just plain good cookbook. It is not at all vegetarian-centric: lots of recipes involving fish and meat (although the chicken stock in the above is all Wombat).
Posted by B T at November 13, 2001 04:15 PM