I like cold weather. It means you get to put on more clothing, turn on the electric blanket and devour soups, stews and copious amounts of mashed potato. So what better way to greet the cooler air and brisker mornings than with a nice steaming pot of pumpkin soup?
Crown pumpkins are coming into season now, and you can pick up a decent one for around $2. You can also get lentils of all colours from the bulk bins for around $1 per 100g (I think). making this a really cheap winter staple.
This was originally going to be a roast pumpkin and garlic soup recipe (that's the way my mum makes it and it is so good), but I was a bit of a goose and used too much pumpkin in the pumpkin pie filling, leaving only three quarters of a pumpkin which resulted in a watery pumpkin soup.
I was debating whether or not it would thicken if I left the water to boil off when it occurred to me to add some of the red lentils I had in the cupboard.
I thought "hey they're red, they'll blend in and as well as that they will boost the fibre and protein content of the soup and once they are all blended in no one will even know!''. Sneaky sneaky.
Mum makes the original soup with curry powder to make it warm and spicy so the lentils worked perfectly, enhancing the pseudo-Indian feel to the soup.
Soup is not rocket science. You can add whatever you want really. I sneakily added some chopped carrots, too. You can even throw in a couple of kumara.
I roasted my pumpkin before throwing it in the stockpot, just to get that warm caramelised flavour as well as to shorten the soup's cooking time, but it isn't necessary.
Actually, the pumpkin in this soup was thrice cooked: microwaved, roasted then boiled. So if you were short on time just skip the roasting part.
In order to cut my massive $2 pumpkin I microwaved it for 15 minutes. Be careful when cutting microwaved pumpkins as they are still quite solid and require a bit of elbow work to get the knife through them. Oh and they are piping hot.
I'm pretty sure this activity could be more dangerous. If you don't chop off your fingers you will be sure to burn them instead.
1 large crown pumpkin (you can use other varieties but just make sure size wise they add up to a large pumpkin's worth - I really should have weighed the pumpkin)
2 onions, diced
5 cloves garlic, diced (if you do roast the pumpkin you can throw a whole bulb of garlic into the roasting tray instead and once it is baked squeeze out the molten garlic pulp into the stockpot)
2 cups red lentils (yellow split peas would work just as well)
10 cups chicken or vege stock
2-3 tsp curry powder (try playing around with some other good warming spices such as turmeric, fenugreek and garam masala for a more intense flavour - I added a teaspoon of fenugreek and yellow mustard seeds to mine but curry powder will be fine on its own)
salt and pepper to taste
Cook the pumpkin in the microwave for 15 minutes until it is soft enough to cut into cubes. You can either go on to microwave the cubes in a large bowl of water until they are soft or you can toss them in a good measure of oil, salt and pepper, add a bulb of garlic and bake them at 180degC for about half an hour until the edges start blackening.
You can remove the skin after cooking them fully as it is much easier, but it doesn't really matter.
Saute the onion and garlic in a large stockpot. Add the curry powder (and other spices) and continue cooking for another 1-2 minutes. Add in the cooked pumpkin cubes and toss in the spices. Pour in the stock and the lentils.
Leave to simmer for 30-40 minutes so that the lentils are really soft.
Using either a stick blender or an actual blender (in batch quantities) blend the soup until smooth. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Serve hot with a good dollop of sour cream on top.
Make sure you get this soup into the fridge as soon as it is cool enough to do so. The high carbohydrate and high moisture content makes it a perfect place for bacteria to grow. Consume this soup within 3-4 days, making sure you properly heat up your portion before eating it.
If you know you aren't going to eat it all in that time, try freezing single-serve portions you can take out and defrost for a quick warming lunch!
Enjoy!
