Meatless Monday - Curried Coconut Vegetable Soup

My poor Marc is sick.  Really gunky, tired and achey sick.  If anyone ever needed a bowl of steamy hot soup full of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and love – it’s Marc. 

I like to keep a variety of spices, beans, rices and gluten free pastas in the pantry to make fast impromptu meals. A couple of bags of frozen veggies in the freezer will round out just about any pantry meal. Lentils are the quickest cooking dried bean/pea I know of so that helped me decide what soup to make.  We them in just about any form – from Sri Lankan Lentils to veggie burgers so why not soup, too?

It takes about ten minutes to put everything together and well under an hour to simmer. You can adjust spices to taste and even vary the amount of water to make a thinner or thicker soup. Any veggies you like will work for this soup but I used a bag of mixed veggies and one of sliced okra today.

Curried Coconut Vegtable Soup

In a very large pan over medium heat, sauté:

1 cup Onion, chopped

2 cloves Garlic, minced

1 teaspoon Cumin

1 teaspoon Tumeric

½ teaspoon Ginger

Cayenne, to taste

Curry Powder, to taste

As soon as the onions and garlic are soft the spices will have cooked enough to bring out their flavors.

Add:

1 cup Red Lentils

1 can Coconut Milk

2 quarts (give or take) Filtered Water

Simmer at least thirty minutes but longer if desired.  At this point you can use an immersion blender to puree the onions and lentils for a smooth and creamy base.  I didn’t do that this time so it’s a bit chunkier with a thinner broth.

Then add:

1 lb. Vegetables – your choice, chopped.  I used a frozen chopped mix this time.

1 lb. Okra sliced – I used frozen this time

1 teaspoon Sea Salt

Simmer until vegetables are cooked through.

Serve with love and enjoy!