Carrot and Red Lentil Soup
Carrot and red lentil soup is a modern European staple with no single home, the kind of thing that turns up in cafe windows from London to Berlin because it is cheap, fast, and forgiving. Red lentils are the trick: they collapse completely as they cook and thicken the whole pot to a velvet cream with no dairy at all. Carrots bring the sweetness, cumin and coriander bloomed in the dry pan bring the warmth, and a good squeeze of lemon at the end does the brightening that salt usually would. It blends smooth in one pot and freezes well, so it is worth making a double batch. Serve it with a shower of parsley and plenty of black pepper.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 lb Carrots (cooking), sliced
- 1 cup Red lentils, rinsed
- 1 whole Yellow onions, diced
- 3 cloves Garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp Ginger, grated
- 1 1/2 tsp Cumin seed, toasted and ground
- 1 tsp Coriander seed, toasted and ground
- 1 tbsp no-salt vegetable bouillon
- 2 tbsp Lemon juice, fresh
- 1/4 cup Flat-leaf parsley, chopped
- 1/2 tsp Black peppercorns, freshly ground
Method
- Sweat the onion in a splash of water in a large pot until soft, about 6 minutes, then add the garlic, ginger, cumin, and coriander and stir for a minute. Toasting the ground spices in the hot pan blooms their oils, releasing far more aroma than if they went in with the liquid.
- Add the carrots, red lentils, bouillon, black pepper, and 5 cups (1.2 L) water. Red lentils and carrots cook down at the same rate, so they are ready to blend together with no separate steps.
- Simmer covered until the lentils have collapsed and the carrots are fork-soft, about 25 minutes. The lentils break down completely into the broth, which is what thickens the soup to a velvet texture with no cream added.
- Blend the soup smooth with an immersion blender, or in batches in a countertop blender. Blending the softened carrot and lentil together is the whole texture of the dish, turning a thin pot into something that coats the spoon.
- Stir in the lemon juice off the heat and taste. The acid is what lifts a sweet, earthy soup out of flatness, doing the brightening job salt would, and a shower of parsley and a grind of pepper finish each bowl.
Nutrition
Estimated per serving: 210 calories, 11 g protein, 9 g fiber, 120 mg sodium. Computed from USDA FoodData Central reference values for the main ingredients. This is an approximation, not a laboratory measurement. How these are computed.
Cost per serving is estimated from US national-average retail prices for cheap staple forms, using BLS dried-bean prices and USDA produce prices. Prices vary by store and season, so treat it as a guide, not a receipt. How this is computed.
