This summer we’ve been eating a lot of soups and stews. It could have been that we were immune to the hot weather, as we spent the majority of it in an air conditioned NICU. Or, more likely, that we’ve been making up for lost time and stocking our freezer with extra food. We have fully adopted making a second batch of a recipe and freezing half. Soups and stews are great for that.
I don’t know if other mamas can relate, but initially, I had no energy or interest to peruse cookbooks and instead only had enough hands (or free fingers) to search my phone for supper ideas. I have had Angela’s soup bookmarked for a while and we took a few liberties with the recipe. Dirtying a blender to make cashew cream? Heck no!! The soup turned out delicious and the summer inspired pea addition was lovely. Enjoy!
Which meals do you like to make and freeze for later?
I am sharing this with Meat Free Mondays, Eat Your Greens and No Croutons Required.
Creamy Summer Cajun Soup
Inspired by Oh She Glows
1 tbsp coconut oil, or oil of choice
1 large shallot, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
4 small carrots, peeled and chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
1 large sweet potato (3 cups), chopped
28 oz can diced tomatoes, with juices
1-2 tbsp 10-Spice Mix
3 tbsp nutritional yeast
1/2 tsp celery seed
Dash no-salt seasoning (TJ’s 21 salute)
6 cups water
400g shelled peas
2 cups cooked chickpeas (19 oz can), rinsed and drained if canned
1/2 soy milk (no cashews used)
1-2 cups baby spinach
- In a large pot over medium heat, heat oil. Once hot, add shallot. Season with salt. Saute until softened, around 5 minutes. Stir in garlic and cook for 1-2 minutes, until fragrant.
- Stir in the carrots, bell pepper, sweet potato, tomatoes with juice, spice mix, nutritional yeast, celery seed, no-salt seasoning and the water. Stir well to combine. Raise heat to bring to a boil then cover, reduce heat to low and simmer the soup for 20 minutes until the vegetables are tender.
- Stir in the peas, chickpeas, soy milk and spinach. Season to taste. Simmer for an additional 5-10 minutes until warmed through and the spinach leaves are a brilliant green. Add additional 10-Spice Mix, to taste.Serves 6.
the taste space 
My first reaction when I saw your delicious-looking soup was, “this is what we should have for dinner.” Then I saw the reference to freezing food for another meal, and changed my mind to, “maybe we should use some of our collected pile of frozen leftovers!” We like to cook enough food for lunch the next day, and maybe another dinner during the week, but freezer space gets kind of tight at our house and we can’t save too many leftovers.
I understand! We ran out of room even to make ice cream this year. 😉 Our freezer was small and even with a deep freezer, it wasn’t a lot of room. We borrowed a second freezer just for this purpose of making food to help when taking care of a baby. 😉
[…] put together during the wee weeks after P’s birth, and they were a welcome change from our current stew-infused menu. They were a bit soft, and certainly not fit for the barbecue, but the flavours were spot on and […]
Just my sort of soup. Thanks so much for sharing with NCR. The roundup should be up shortly.