Carrot and Coriander Soup

There are at least one or two more raspberry postings to come but let’s take a break from all that red and have some lovely orange now shall we? For dinner, I made a lovely carrot and coriander soup from a recipe I plucked out of Slow Recipes 500 but I enriched the soup a little with a touch of cream. After the New Year festivities, dinners, barbeques and berrylicious desserts, it was time for some wholesome vegetable soup made with young carrots harvested from our garden last week. Don’t they look gorgeous?

Our garden has flourished; J has done an exceptional job tending to the vegetable patch. This is our second batch of carrots and they are so sweet.

The soup recipe was designed for the slow cooker so I’ve modified this for the stove-top which means less waiting around.

Carrot and Coriander Soup
(adapted from Slow Recipes 500 with slight modifications to the some of the ingredients and cooking method)
serves 4

450 g carrots, preferably young and tender, trimmed and peeled (I left mine unpeeled)
15 ml sunflower oil (I used cooking olive oil)
40 g butter
1 onion, chopped ( 1 large or 2 small onions)
1 stick celery, sliced plus 2 – 3 leafy tops (I omitted the leaves)
2 small potatoes, peeled and chopped (I like potato skins so I left mine unpeeled)
1 litre vegetable stock (or chicken stock if you prefer)
2 teaspoon ground coriander
1 tablespoon chopped fresh coriander
100 ml milk
60 ml cream
salt and ground black pepper

Method

Heat the oil and 25 g of the butter in a saucepan or pot and fry the onion over gentle heat for 3 – 4 minutes until slightly softened. Do not let it brown.
Add the sliced celery and chopped potatoes to the onion in the pan. Cook for 2 minutes, then add the carrots and cook for a further minute.
Add the vegetable/chicken stock; bring to the boil then half-cover with lid and let simmer for 1 hour or until the vegetables are tender; turn off heat.
Melt the remaining butter in a pan and add the ground coriander; fry for 1-2 minutes, stirring constantly until the aromas are released.
Reduce the heat under the pan and add the chopped celery tops/leaves; fry for about 30 seconds then remove pan from heat.
Ladle the soup into a food processor or blender (a stick blender works best – less mess to clean up after) and process until smooth; add in the celery tops, ground coriander and chopped fresh coriander.
Stir in the milk and cream and heat gently until piping hot.
Adjust seasoning and garnish with extra coriander or celery leaves.