Butternut Squash Soup with Pear, Apple Cider and Vanilla

How much is half a bushel?

Technically, it is 4 pecks or 8 gallons.

After this weekend, to me, it means 26.6 lbs of apples.

Or 66 apples!

And a bargain at $15.75 (60c/lb!)

(our bushel was slightly rounded, hehe)

Last weekend, Rob and I travelled to Birtch Farms for some DIY apple picking. We were expecting to come home with Cortland and Empire, but were tickled pink when we found out that Mutsu (aka Crispin), Jonagold and Ida Red were also ripe for picking!

Rob had never had Mutsu before, and thankfully we were encouraged to sample the apples first to figure out which we preferred. Mutsu was the clear winner for a snacking apple, followed by the Ida Red. While the Jonagold is a cross between a Jonathan and Golden Delicious, I thought it tasted too much like a Gala for me to enjoy it. Sadly, we missed the Honeycrisp picking season, and I don’t think they grow Ambrosia out here, which are my 2 favourite snacking apples. Mutsu will be my go-to apple for the next month or so, though!

Rob also picked up some fresh apple cider for the road and when we returned I made this delicious soup.

A butternut squash soup with pear, apple cider and vanilla from Orangette.

Who says vanilla is only for sweet desserts?

Add it to your savoury dishes, as well.

Sometimes you can go too sweet with squash but here, everything was balanced nicely. The pear and cider are sweet, but the vanilla calms it down. It was smooth and creamy from the squash and milk. A delightful light, creamy soup.

Perfect for your next Thanksgiving meal. Or any day you want a delicious heart-warming soup.

This is being submitted to this week’s Weekend Herb Blogging, hosted by Chris from Mele Cotte.

Tomato Tarragon Soup

While in Iceland, I must admit that I didn’t try many traditional Icelandic meals. My Icelandic finds mainly consisted of Icelandic herbal teas, whereas Rob tried the beer-boiled Icelandic hotdog and other traditional fish- and lamb-based dishes. He also discovered chocolate-covered licorice, an Icelandic candy! Licorice is actually a popular flavour for Icelandic candy. Yucko I say!

I have a few food aversions. Celery. Coffee. And yes, licorice.

And what do I buy from Sunny’s on a whim when I return?

Tarragon.

A new-to-me herb.

I had no idea what it even tasted like when I bought it, but I knew I had seen it in a few recipes recently. A big bunch was a $1 so I snapped it up.

You know what’s coming up….  It tastes like licorice! Like anise! Oh no! But I decided to forge ahead.. otherwise I would have wasted a $1.

I spotted this simple soup with tomato and tarragon in Rebar for my first taste of tarragon. It was a wonderful introduction to the herby epitome of French cuisine. It has a regal taste, in that it is not so harsh as licorice. The light flavour is delicious. It pairs great with tomato in this soup which is zippy from the garlic and chili flakes. I also wanted to add further creaminess and bulk, so I added in white beans prior to pureeing it.

People love CSAs because they are introduced to new veggies and are forced to use them in creative ways.  I get the same trippy feeling whenever I go to Sunny’s and scour their bargain section. I have no a clue what I will come home with… and this time, tarragon was a winner.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s Food Palette series featuring the rainbow, and to this week’s Wellness Weekends.

15-Minute White Bean and Kale Soup

While the Baked White Beans with Garlic, Lemon, and Herbs takes an hour and half to bake, it doesn’t take that long to prep. I have become used to cooking my own beans on the stovetop, and routinely cook a big batch, freezing them in 1.5 cups portions with the bean cooking liquid. This way, when a recipe calls for a can of beans, I have exactly what I need in my freezer. I also have canned beans for all my emergency bean needs because as I am learning, my freezer isn’t actually that big.

This is a super quick soup, courtesy of Tess and thus literally bursting with flavour. White beans, kale and a host of flavours (garlic, lemon, celery seed, dill) are combined for delicious results. While you usually have to simmer a soup for complex flavours, here you only have to blend and heat. Almost an instant soup. With a dirty blender and a pot.

I adapted it from Radiance 4 Life, by increasing the kale and using lemon pepper for extra zing. Funnily enough, I hate celery but don’t mind celery seeds and thought they helped create many levels of flavour. The balsamic vinegar works well for the soup as well, but it makes the soup a bit murky. If you have white balsamic vinegar, this would be the time to use it.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays and to this week’s Wellness Weekends.

Thai Coconut Corn Stew

How do you bookmark your recipes? Every day I am inundated by oodles of recipes I want to make from other bloggers, from my cookbooks, or just something I whip up in my head (and belly).

I know there are applications and websites to help you figure this out, but they have been too cumbersome for me. I am old school. I email myself the recipes and stick them in a searchable folder. The rest, my brain has to take care of, as it remembers what I don’t put into emails.

When I can’t find a suitable recipe in my email treasure trove or rack my brain as to what’s in my cookbooks, I will often consult my favourite bloggers. My favourite way to tackle this is through Google Reader, which is a quick and easy way to narrow my search to my blogs of interest.

So when Rob and I picked up a dozen ears of corn, I had to scour everywhere for corn recipes. I usually don’t like corn – of the frozen or canned variety. I will actively remove it from recipes (celery gets removed even more quickly) so it was a challenge to do the opposite. Find me some corn delicacies!

Hopefully the last few corny posts have shown you how great corn can be, from the simple grilled ears, to pan-toasting the kernels for a salad, or boiling the corn to put in a quinoa salad, or as a savoury filling for a cornmeal pancake.

Corn soups are another way to enjoy corn. Trust me, I have bookmarked so many corn soup recipes that I had a difficult time narrowing it down to which I wanted to try. In the end, I thought this Thai Coconut Corn Stew, which Ashley made last year from Eat, Drink & Be Vegan hit it right (recipe also posted here). A soup that could come together quickly despite its long ingredient list.  In addition to the coconut milk as the backdrop for the chowder, red bell pepper is added for sweetness. The soup is flavoured with lemongrass, lime, ginger, cilantro and a hint of spice from chili flakes, creating a very complex soup without too much fuss. It is nice and creamy from the coconut milk and pureed corn, but also surprisingly light at the same time. Seriously yummy, this recipe is a keeper!

In all honesty, I didn’t use cilantro for the salad. I used Vietnamese coriander. While researching what to plant, we found out cilantro tends to bolt in the summer. Ours bolted during the heat wave. But we had a back-up! Vietnamese coriander! It continues to give us nice leaves that taste similar to cilantro with a bright, lemony accent. Thankfully it is a perennial, so we should have some of it next year, too. I also grew lemongrass but the stalks don’t look anything like what I buy in the grocery store.. so who knows what I am to do with the leaves only. Sunny’s to the rescue with 6 lemongrass stalks for a $1.

Here are some other corn soups that I had spotted elsewhere:

Roasted Tomato and Grilled Corn Soup from The Edible Perspective
Summer Sweet Corn Soup with Basil Oil from Julia’s Vegan Kitchen
Roasted Red Pepper Soup with Corn and Cilantro from Oui, Chef
Tomato, Corn and Basil Soup from New England Soup Factory Cookbook
Sweet Pepper Coconut Corn Chowder from ExtraVeganZa
Summer Corn and Coconut Soup from Choosing Raw
Corn and Squash Soup with Roasted Red Pepper Purée from CIA Chef
Japanese Corn Cream Soup from The Well-Seasoned Cook

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s Simple and in Season, to this month’s My Kitchen, My World destination Thailand, to Ricki’s Wellness Weekends, to this month’s Bookmarked Recipes, to this month’s Ingredient Challenge Monday for coconut, and to this month’s No Croutons Required featuring home-grown produce.

Mango Gazpacho

My mom judges how good a dish tastes by whether there are leftovers. No leftovers means it must have been tasty, right?

So when she made Spanish Chickpea Salad with Capers and Roasted Red Peppers for a potluck, I asked her how she liked it. “It was all gone!” But how did you like it? “It was great!”

When she made Bulgur and Cantaloupe Salad with Hazelnuts and Mint for her barbecue, I asked her how she liked it. “It was all gone!” But how did you like it? “I didn’t even get to try it, it was gone so fast!” Wowzas!

Personally, I don’t subscribe to the if-there-are-leftovers-they-didn’t-like-it camp. It all depends on how much food is available. I tend to err on the side of too much food so that no one can say they left hungry. Granted, this means I make dishes that will make great leftovers for me, and usually a large batch of the recipe, at that.

Recently, my brother and sister-in-law were over for dinner while Rob was out-of-town and trust me, I erred on the side of more food. I included this soup as an after-thought, after I had already decided to double the recipe for the main dish. They still demolished the meal, which was sad for Rob, because he wasn’t able to try any of the leftovers. Because I definitely had Rob in mind (mango lover extraordinaire) as I prepared this last-minute mango gazpacho.

Adapted from The 30-Minute Vegan, this is a wonderful chilled soup with summer salsa flavours. Gazpacho is a Spanish chilled soup typically filled with tomatoes, peppers and onions that is partially pureed to give it a chunky soup-like consistency. In this Thai-fusion version, mango is added to the traditional tomatoes and bell peppers, along with cilantro and parsley. The sweetness from the mango is countered beautifully by the zippiness from chili flakes and chile powder. It took me a bit longer than 30 minutes to chop everything for the soup, but it was a very simple soup to prepare. I found it tasted best after a long chill, almost 6 hours, which is a perfect make-ahead summer appetizer.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to My Kitchen, My World for Spain, to E.A.T. World for Spain, and to this month’s Simple and in Season, to Ricki’s new Summer Wellness Weekends and to this month’s No Croutons Required for raw salads/soups for Lisa’s birthday (I’d also serve this with Savoury Hemp Crackers as a side, Raw Tacos with Walnut Taco Meat, Cashew Sour Cream and Tomato Salsa as our main and Raw Tropical Mango Pie for dessert).

Luscious Lentil and Basil Soup

I had lofty gardening goals. My mom told me not to get disappointed if things didn’t work out as planned. I told her all I wanted was my kale to grow.

Let’s just say my garden is not as prolific as Angela’s.

I know the summer has only just begun, but the only thing I have harvested from my garden has been herbs. Since they are in pots, on my back porch, does it really count as my garden? (Of course it is, but you know what I mean!)

I can grow mint and basil.

Last year, somehow, I used mint in so many recipes, that I picked my plant clean and it never bounced back. I thought it was a weed, a perennial at that, but it didn’t even come back for a second year (my garlic chives did, though!). Fair enough, my cousin, who also got a portion of the same plant from my mom, also did not get her mint to return a second year. So it isn’t just my black thumb.

I used this as an opportunity to try different varieties of mint. Richters Herbs sells over 40 different kinds, ranging from the wacky like Marshmallow Mint and Cotton Candy Mint to Peppermint and Swiss Mint. We sampled each one before narrowing in on English Mint, Moroccan Mint and Chocolate Mint. My cousin replaced hers with Mojito Mint!

For basil, I know the problem of the flowering basil and thus am really pleased with my Pesto Perpetuo basil that won’t flower.  Just luscious leaves! We also planted some Lesbos basil which has a savoury note and not as pungent as the traditional Genovese basil. My favourite, though, purely by how I acquired it, is my prolific Genovese basil. Remember the 300g of basil I bought when I made the delicious Asparagus, Strawberry and Basil Salad with Mosto Cotto? Since the bunch of basil included the roots, I planted a bunch of the plants into my pot and they have flourished!

Most of my herbs are doing well! The oregano, thyme (English and French varieties), rosemary, Vietnamese coriander, lemon verbena, parsley and cilantro… Even the lemongrass looks bushy! The Thai basil isn’t looking too hot, though, but I didn’t really have any culinary masterpieces picked out for it since I don’t like its anise flavour.

We have some green tomatoes and a few snow peas are beginning to show up, too, but my kale is still tiny. So is my rainbow Swiss chard. I swear my kale is still 6 inches tall and has seemed to have hit a slump in growth. Stuck at 6 inches for the last month. While baby Red Russian kale would be delicious, I only have 4 leaves on each plant!   Hopefully as the summer progresses, they will be revived.

In an effort to use my bountiful basil crop, without resorting to the typical pesto (yet), I found this delicious lentil soup with veggies and basil in The Natural Vegan Kitchen. It is slightly different than the recipe posted online here and my adapted recipe is below.

I seem to have an affinity for lentils and carrots, and this soup did not disappoint even though it was a minor component. I don’t often cook typical Italian, but the hint Italian flavours of basil, oregano and thyme were lovely in this soup beefed up with sweet potato and cabbage. Of course, the full cup of fresh basil is what brings this soup out of the standard Italian fare.  Scrap soup, I mean stew, even after adding another 2 cups of water. I like my soups hearty, though, so no complaints from my end.

What are your favourite recipes with basil? This is what I have enjoyed previously:

Blueberry Mango Quinoa Salad with a Lemon Basil Dressing
Asparagus, Strawberry and Basil Salad with Mosto Cotto
Creamy Zucchini and Basil Soup
Summer Vegetable Pasta Salad with Lemon Basil Almond Pesto
Saffron Marinated Paneer Cheese with Fresh Basil, Cashews and Pomegranate Seeds (not vegan, substitute paneer with tofu)
Spanish Lentil and Mushroom Stew
Asparagus and Chickpea Stir-Fry with Hoisin Sauce

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s Veggie/Fruit A Month with carrots, to this month’s Simple and in Season and to Ricki’s new Summer Wellness Weekends.

Roasted Carrot and Lentil Soup with Harissa and Mint

I may have lamented about the explosion of condiments, but I am positive Rob was perplexed by my fascination of his hot sauce collection. Coming from me, the Queen of Non Spicy.

Before we moved in, I kept interrogating Rob.

Do you have sweet chili sauce? Yes. Followed by, I put it on anything! It is my favourite condiment!

The next day…

Do you have sriracha? Is that the rooster sauce? Then, yes! But I think that’s too spicy for you…

Do you have sambal oelek? No! That stuff is too spicy even for me!

The next week…

Do you have harissa? What’s that?

By this time, I had my heart set on making this lentil stew with roasted carrots, harissa and mint from Love Soup. My usual go-to substitution of all things chili is my beloved Aleppo chili flakes that I bought in Turkey, more flavourful than spicy.

Then I investigated harissa, a Tunisian pepper paste, and found that it seemed more savoury than spicy with roasted red pepper combined with coriander, cumin, cinnamon and caraway. While you can purchase harissa, the bonus, of course, of making it yourself, is that you can change the recipe to your own palate. While a mixture of hot and mild chilies, like Ancho and New Mexican chilies, are suggested for harissa, I based my version on Bon Appetit‘s recipe since it focused on chili flakes, not whole Ancho chilis. In fact, while modifying the recipe, I was quite bold as I doubled the Aleppo chili flakes, as they are known to not be too spicy. I also substituted cumin for the caraway, added a dash of cinnamon and omitted the sugar. All the spices were toasted and freshly ground. Since I was a bit hesitant how I would handle it, I only made a 1/4 of the recipe the first time.

But I did not need to worry: this zingy but savoury red pepper blend is delicious. It works really well with this soup and while you could make the soup without the harissa, I think you would be missing out on its complexity.

So about the soup…. caramelized, roasted carrots and onions are combined to create a silky sweet soup with lentils. That alone would be a nice soup, but the twist comes from the lemon and mint, and of course the harissa. With my mild-mannered harissa, the soup easily handled 2 tbsp but add with caution because harissa can vary from mild to incredibly spicy! Sweet, sour and spicy… we know this is a winning combination.

And that is how I contributed to the spicy condiments in the new house.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s Veggie/Fruit A Month with carrots, to this month’s No Croutons Required featuring hot peppers, to E.A.T. World for Tunisia, to Ivonne at Cream Puffs in Venice for this week’s Magazine Mondays, to this month’s Simple and in Season and to Ricki’s new Summer Wellness Weekends.

Spicy Indonesian Yam and Peanut Soup

My friends recently hosted an international-themed potluck. Everyone brought a dish from another country. A real melange of flavours.

While most of my cooking comes from an international menu, I used this opportunity to try a cuisine I knew next to nothing about: Indonesia. While I have cooked with tempeh, fermented tofu originating from Indonesia, I didn’t really know much else.

While browsing through Love Soup, I spotted this curious soup: it featured a host of vegetables including carrots, parsnips and yams (yes, I had a monster yam that weighed 900g and even another that weighed 1100g!), flavoured with earthy tones from cumin and garam masala, spiced with garlic, ginger and chili flakes, lightened with sourness from both tamarind and fresh lemon juice, and coming together with a hint of lusciousness from the peanut butter. My mouth is watering as I write this…

At first, I wasn’t sure how this would be a spicy soup: I substituted garam masala for the curry powder and was only using a small amount of chili flakes for such a large amount of soup. Have no fear, this is a zingy soup with all the right amount of zing. The culprit? The savior? Half a cup of grated ginger, tempered by the peanut butter. Boo-yah! Joanne pointed out I was on a ginger kick, and yes, I am loving it!

This soup has a great mix of flavours – warm yet spicy, creamy yet light, zingy and sour.  Soups get the shaft in the summer, but I think they are great any time. Share this with friends, because it makes a lot of soup. It also freezes well.

This is my submission to My Kitchen, My World for Indonesian travels, to E.A.T. World for Indonesia, and to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays.

Carrot and Roasted Red Pepper Soup

I love soups.  Mostly one-bowl complete meal kind of soups, but I have ventured out into some lighter soups as well. Thick soups, thin soups, chunky soups, pureed soups – what is there not to like?

I know some people don’t like pureed soups. It reminds them of baby food.

Recently, I was visiting an old friend for dinner, where she made a nice carrot, sweet potato and orange soup which she also fed to her 1-year-old son. Suffice it to say, this kid had no taste! The hooting and screeching was incredible once he tried the soup, which my friend attributed to his aversion to garlic and onion. He was much happier with a macaroni salad, instead.

Not that I remember what baby food tastes like from my childhood, but simple ingredients can lead to a delicious soup. An old recipe of mine from university used 4 ingredients for a decadent butternut squash and roasted red pepper soup. I wonder if Baby T would like that soup (onion but no garlic!).

Sometimes, though, I want something a bit more edgy, a bit more complex.

Welcome this Carrot and Roasted Red Pepper Soup that I adapted from Color Me Vegan (original recipe also posted here). The name sounds similar to my old stand-by, and with roasted red pepper as a main ingredient, I knew I would like it. I just didn’t know I would love it. Thankfully, while the ingredient list is longer, it is just as easy to make once you’ve got everything assembled. This is an adult soup, though.

I modified the original recipe slightly, choosing to roast my own red peppers (easy and tastes better) while I chopped and cooked the first couple of ingredients. I substituted a large sweet potato for the potato and only used 1 cup of soy milk to get my desired consistency. I also omitted the cayenne, but a dash of red pepper flakes would have been a great addition.

The result was a complex, but still light and creamy soup. The sweetness from the roasted red peppers works well with the carrots, and the pureed sweet potato adds a creamy sweetness as well.  I found the sherry to be a welcome flavour, and a great way to cook the vegetables without any oil. But the secret ingredient was the miso. It really added a depth of flavour that had you begging for more. Baby T may not want it, but if you are older, you will.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s No Croutons Required featuring roasted vegetables, and to this month’s Simple and in Season for June.

Six Shades of Red Soup (Beet, Potato and Red Lentil Soup with Dill)

Despite being of Central and Eastern European descent, I actually don’t cook many German or Ukrainian dishes (mainly special treats, though). However, Rob’s parents are very keen on traditional Polish food, and when they came to visit last weekend to help with the burgeoning garden, I wanted to create a meal that everyone would enjoy.

I knew the raw kale salad with beets was a hit over Easter, so I figured I would pick a dish that had similar familiar ingredients: beets, potatoes and dill. That may sound so boring and bland, but I knew I hit jackpot when I spotted the Six Shades of Red Soup in Color Me Vegan (original recipe posted here). It was a virtually fat-free soup filled with red lentils, red potatoes, beets, (red) onion, dill and the perfect twist: red miso. The sixth shade of red was from vegetable juice, which I omitted. I also increased the dill and pureed half the soup for a creamier consistency.

As you can see, this was a beautiful soup.  It deepened in colour overnight and the flavours melded wonderfully. It was creamy, yet chunky, with sweetness from the beets but structure from the potatoes with a hint of dill and a depthness brought from the red miso.

I am happy to report that it met the approval of the traditional Polish folk. Not your traditional borscht, different, but in a  good way, is how they put it and invited me to make it again anytime. Me, redo a recipe? By request from special people only!

This made a ton of soup, with generous servings, so I was able to enjoy the leftovers. The soup doubled as a perfect meal while cycling last weekend. With the long distances, I prefer to eat more liquid-based foods (ie, soup! homemade sports drink! smoothies!) and this hit the spot. It was light on my stomach and jammed full of vegetables and miso providing sodium and potassium, which is important to replenish when exercising.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s My Legume Love Affair, hosted by Served with Love and to this month’s Bookmarked Recipes, founded by Ruth’s Kitchen Experiments and hosted by Jacqueline.

Orange Beet Soup

I should judge the difficulty of recipes on my ability to make them after a bike ride (yam and black bean stew, I’ve got my eyes on you!). To be honest, I don’t think any of my recipes are hard to make (heck, even I can make it!) but I know some can be lengthy, especially if dried beans are involved.

Last weekend, I cycled to Kitchener with a friend. We opted to take a shorter route home, cycling to the Aldershot GO Station in Burlington and training the rest of the way home. I cycled 209km that weekend, and with the shorter distance on Sunday, it meant I was home by 3:30pm and able to do some weekend chores.

Um, no. Utter fail.

I got as far as: a) blending myself a recovery smoothie with banana and maca; b) during the post-ride euphoria, calling Rob to tell him I arrived alive; c) taking a nice warm bath; d) throwing all my cycling clothes in the washing machine to get washed;  e) making this soup; f) unexpectedly catching up with an old friend over the phone for an hour…. Giving my mom a well-deserved (brain-supported) phone call, unfortunately was not in the cards (=biggest failure).

Thank goodness I still had some delicious leftover raw pad thai for dinner that I picked up from Thrive Juice Bar in Waterloo (which travelled incredibly well over 80km on my bike!). (Their big green juice with maca was also exactly what I needed when I finally arrived in Waterloo).

Anyways, I had a few recipes on my week’s menu, but was only able to muster enough energy to make this Orange Beet Soup, adapted from The 30-Minute Vegan. I figured it would be a simple thing to throw together and should take under 30 minutes, right?

Obviously, in my post-cycle haze, my coordination (hand and mental) decrease. It took me more like 45 minutes and I didn’t even grate my vegetables by hand (thank you food processor!) plus another 15 minutes to clean (curse you food processor!) . I peeled my beets which took up a lot of time, and probably unnecessary in retrospect.

Also problematic: juicing my oranges. 1.5 cups of freshly squeezed orange juice. By me armed with my lemon squisher. 4 oranges later and many more minutes later, I had it all. Reinfeld may suggest 1-2 oranges, but that is impossible! Unless you get so much more juice with a juicer? Or pick an incredibly juicy one from a tree in Florida? Because I use all the pre-juicing tricks: microwave for 20 seconds, smash it and roll it around on the counter. And it took me just over 3 oranges.

Anyways, I will see if my kitchen speed increases if I were to make this at any other time.

Because this is a great soup and should get repeated. Like when I have a garden filled with beets (oh yes!).

Simple ingredients layer to create a nice, light, flavourful soup. Beet is at its core, but it is sweet from the layers of  orange and carrots. The dill add another dimension with a nod to the Eastern European pairing of beet and dill, and the red miso creates that subtle complexity.

This soup is great warm and chilled. Chilled, it is a refreshing and bright starter and if I had a high-powered blender, this would make this the ultimate savoury summer drink (my immersion blender left a bit of pulp, which is fine for something labelled as soup).

After hanging up with my friend, it was 7pm, and I was positively pooped. I didn’t even photograph the soup. Yet. (It was photographed as leftovers the next day, which is also when my mom got the brain-active phone call she deserved!).

I cleaned up my kitchen and called it a night and fell asleep around 8pm, before the sun had even gone to bed.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays.

Yam and Black Bean Stew with Orange and Cilantro

So what kind of meal would you make if you were hosting a dinner party after cycling 100km?

Without going to the grocery store, to boot.

While I prefer not to try new recipes on unsuspecting guests, I warned my brother and sister-in-law that this was a new recipe… AND that I would likely be pooped post-bike ride. They were fine with the menu.

The most important part of having them over is not about the food, you see, it was about catching up. How their plans for puppy parenthood are progressing, moving plans on both ends, and since my apartment is now on the market to be rented, it has never looked cleaner. Oh, and games. Fun was had by all as we introduced them to Bananagrams and Dominion.

I still get a bit stressed when choosing a menu for guests. My tastes have changed and I would like to showcase how great the food tastes. A bit harder to do without rehearsing a recipe, but I trusted the complementary flavours within this soup stew. Yam, black beans, orange, cilantro – what’s not to like?

I adapted this recipe from Appetite for Reduction to create a heartier soup, I mean stew.  I decreased the amount of yam, increased the black beans, used canned tomatoes instead of fresh and, of course, used Aleppo chili flakes instead of the serrano peppers.

The yams, partially mashed, created a creamy consistency which meshed well with the extra black beans. I squeezed 2 Navel oranges to acquire 1 cup of fresh orange juice. This added more of a lightness to the soup, rather than an intense orange flavour. The sweet cilantro and orange paired well with the slight zing from the Aleppo pepper.

Let me tell you how perfect this stew was:

1) It is a very easy recipe easy. I had no problems whipping this up after the bike ride, since it came together quite seamlessly.

2) It serves 8, so there was plenty of food for seconds. And (souper) leftovers for me!

3) It tasted very good. No complaints from my guests. Not a typical meal for company, but it would suit me well if I visited someone.

4) For recovery meals after endurance-based exercise, this was ideal with a high carb content. As is, this has a 1:5 protein:carb ratio, but enjoy it with a glass of soy milk for an overall 1:3.5 ratio. Apparently, liquid-based meals are easiest to digest while in recovery so a soup is perfect.

Sounds like a winning meal for everyone.

This is my submission to this month’s My Legume Love Affair, hosted by Smitha of Kannada Cuisine.

Green Soup with Ginger

They say to eat a rainbow, but I am trying to eat more green, as the reds and oranges come too naturally to me.  I am also trying to figure out what to plant in my garden, and Swiss chard made the potential list. Truth be told, this was my first time eating Swiss chard. This got me thinking, why the heck is that?

Because, I am a sucker for sales.

And you know what, Swiss chard never goes on sale (neither do pea shoots, and what a treat it was to discover those!). I get side-tracked when baby spinach is less than $4/lb, or wooed when red peppers are under $1/lb, and perfectly smitten when juicy navel oranges are 33 cents/lb (yes, there will be many recipes with orange to come!). But Swiss chard had never made it to my grocery list, until now.

I spotted this recipe in Love Soup (Heidi had already posted the recipe here, too), and was impressed that there was nearly a pound of leafy greens in the soup! Plus, there was a sweet potato and ginger, as well, which I knew worked well from my previous Japanese Winter Stew.

I preferred the soup prior to pureeing it, where I could taste each individual ingredient. The caramelized onions lent a delicious sweetness to the soup, the ginger a bit of  bite, the sweet potato proffered its creaminess, all the while dancing around the multitude of greens (feel free to substitute your favourites). You pile in so many vegetables but they wilt down nicely, as you can see.

Other than using baby spinach, I followed the recipe fairly closely.  This is surprisingly a quick soup to make, but I took the longer one-pot route. Anna suggests caramelizing your onions while the rest of the soup simmers, but I really wanted to deglaze the pan after caramelizing my onions, so I waited for my onions to finish and then threw the rest of the ingredients in afterwards.

Then I pureed it, and it both looked and tasted completely different. The green highlighted how much green really was in the soup!  The soup had become a chameleon, because now it tasted like a melange of flavours since it was all blended together. The same, but different. Two soups for the price of one! I preferred the former, and I think my camera did as well, but for those who get leftover fatigue by the end of the week, the option to puree it is a good one.

I am so excited about Love Soup, as all the recipes look delicious, and perfect for someone with a backyard filled with vegetables. I can’t wait to plant some Swiss chard this summer (yes, it made the cut) and explore more of Anna Thomas’ recipes.

This is my submission to this week’s Potluck Party for cold remedies and Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays.

Red Lentil and Lemon Soup

Since declaring myself vegan (although in addition to cutting out dairy, fish and meat, I have also cut out refined sugars, flours, breads and pasta; focusing more on fruits, vegetables, whole grains and legumes), this has caused quite a hubbub amongst my friends and family when we eat together. What will I eat? Does the restaurant have a Janet-friendly vegan option? And what the heck will I eat over Easter?

I didn’t really anticipate this, because my meals have gradually become vegan over time. Combined with a few new cookbooks and new (and old) blogs that I follow, the transition in my own kitchen has been easy and gone un-noticed for the most part. I just had to switch from my 1% milk to a nondairy drink (I have been meticulously documenting my experiences to find my favourite).

I am hoping my blog can inspire others to try recipes that are filled with more whole foods. Contrary to popular belief, the foods I eat taste good. I make no apologies for including a lot of fresh produce and spices, because that’s where the flavour comes from.

However, there are lots of recipes that I make that are very simple and fast, too. I first made this soup to rave reviews from my family over Christmas, including my Dad who doesn’t really like beans, and I plan on breaking it out again over Easter. Adapted from the New York Times, red lentils are simmered into a creamy yet chunky soup, that is complemented by a smoky cumin-tomato broth  yet becomes a light soup with the fresh lemon juice. The cilantro is stirred right into the soup and adds the brightness that makes this soup so special, so please do not skip this step.  Such a simple recipe, yet it is more than the sum of its parts. Decadent enough to be served to company and quick enough to prepare so that you can enjoy their company instead of labouring in the kitchen. Easy to double so you can enjoy leftovers for a few days.

What vegan meals do you enjoy sharing with others that are not vegan?

This is being submitted to this week’s Weekend Herb Blogging, hosted by Haalo from Cook (Almost) Anything.

Brazilian Black Bean Soup

While I adore winter soups and stews, and some of my favourite produce is abundant during the winter (butternut squash, sweet potatoes, kale), sometimes the local produce gets to me by the end of the season.  One way to beat the winter blahs, is to incorporate fruit into my meals.  This time of the year, citrus is abundant, which is a good way to liven any dish. One of my favourite soups this winter was the Spinach, Orange, Yam Soup, due to the lightness from the fresh orange juice. This week, I hope to highlights different ways of including tropical fruit into your meals.

Beans are a good way to add heartiness to a soup, and this is a hearty, healthy and tasty black bean soup. I first spotted this recipe for Brazilian Black Bean Soup on Joanne’s blog Eats Well With Others, and was amused because I also have The Tropical Vegan Kitchen but had skimmed over the recipe (oh so many recipes on my hit-list).  I loved Joanne’s modifications, where she substituted mango juice for the orange juice, increased the vegetables and omitted the rice. I substituted the tomato with 1/3 cup of pureed tomatoes, removed additional stock and used red pepper instead of green. This would constitute all the components for a delicious soup, but the spices brought this soup to the next level: it includes cinnamon, cloves and thyme. Seemingly so different, but a wonderful merriment of content. This soup is like a Brazilian party on your tongue.

This is my submission to Deb for this week’s Souper Sundays, to this month’s My Legume Love Affair, hosted by Jaya at Desi Soccer Mom, E.A.T. World for Brazil and this month’s No Croutons Required featuring legumes (since I was born in June).