Lentil Soup

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This has been one of my staple foods this year. The base is always a bag of dried lentils, a big pot of water, and whatever vegetables I have in the refrigerator (it just occurred to me that “refrigerator” is such a bizarre word! it’s so… functional. i can just imagine a group of engineers sitting around a table in the 1950’s thinking of a name… colderator… chillerator… rechillerator… frigid… reFRIGErator!… brilliant).

This particular lentil soup was made by stir-frying a whole whack of carrots, celery, onions, garlic till tender (other possibilities – leeks, potatoes, squash, any other “hard” vegetable). For value-added flavour, I added some turkey stock I had made with some turkey bits the day before (so this version is not completely vegetarian, but usually i just use water). For seasoning I added bay leaves, cumin, just a bit of salt, and ginger.

I also chose to use red lentils. Red lentils are the cuter more attractive member of the lentil family. I like to use them because they cook faster and they look better once cooked, even though for some reason they tend to be more expensive than the green ones. Pureeing a lot of carrots into there would make it more orangey. But it was otherwise very tasty.

So there’s lunch! Fresh organic romaine lettuce salad, home-made soup, and multi-grain bread of the supermarket variety. The leftovers were frozen in boxes, which is why a meal like this is great for students when you’re at home feeling hungry and neglected and suddenly remember you have some thick soup in the freezer. For my next lentil soup I’m going to calculate the cost of it – $-wise I also think it’s quite student-friendly, depending on the veggies you add.

The preparation time is about 15 minutes for washing and chopping all the veggies, and 45 min – 1 hour of mainly unsupervised slow cooking on the stove (it just needs the occasional stir).

P.S. This is the first real entry, so I want you to know that I welcome comments, suggestions, adaptations!

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Filed under legumes, soups, student-friendly, vegetarian