On these chilly days, I automatically reach for the lentils.Nothing is as warming as having a big pot of lentil soup in the fridge, ready to be re-heated in the middle of a busy day of gardening, or eaten in the evening by the fire with hot rolls and butter.
Best of all, lentils are a very good source of both soluble and insoluble fiber. They help your body lower cholesterol and keep your colon healthy. And like all legumes, they are good for the heart. They have significant quantities of folate which lowers homocysteine and magnesium which helps your veins and arteries relax.
This is the lentil soup we've been eating this week. It's actually more of a stew than a soup. You can serve it over brown rice, or add a little extra liquid and eat it as a thick soup.
Vary the recipe depending on what's in your fridge. I was going to add turnips, but they seem to have disappeared from the Hollywood Farmers Market. I fried up some cipollini onions, which add a sweet rich flavor, but regular onions would be fine too, or even the small white pearl onions. If you don't have fresh rosemary, use 1 tsp dried. Rosemary is good for the digestion, so it's a good herb to add to bean dishes if you don't eat them enough that your body is used to breaking them down.
Like all good soups, this one gets better with age. So make a big pot and enjoy it throughout the week, knowing that it is good for your body and soul.
Thick Lentil Soup
1 cup green lentils, picked over and rinsed
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped fine
4 carrots, diced
1 leek
4 medium-sized potatoes, peeled and diced
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 tbsp fresh rosemary, chopped
28-oz can diced tomatoes
3 tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
8-9 cipollini onions
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1 tbsp lemon juice
Put the lentils, onion, garlic, carrots, leek, potato, celery and rosemary in a large pot, and cover with a quart of water. Bring to a boil, cover and simmer 45-50 minutes until the lentils are tender.
Add the tomatoes with their juice, tomato paste, salt and pepper. Simmer gently.
Peel and halve the cipollini onions and fry in the vegetable oil until golden brown. Add to the pot.
Stir in lemon juice just before serving.
Serves 6-8
I do a similar recipe - "Lentil Barley Stew" from the More with Less cookbook. I love the combo of lentils and barley. B likes the green lentils, but I prefer the regular ones.
ReplyDeleteI use the fresh rosemary unchopped so that I can retrieve and toss the sprigs after cooking. Should I leave the rosemary to retain the benefits to digestion?
Which lentils do you consider "the regular ones"? The orange ones?
ReplyDeleteLetting the rosemary cook in the soup should steep a lot of the nutritious and digestive elements from the leaves into the soup. So you don't need to chop and add it. However, I always think that eating the whole food brings benefits we don't yet know about. Plus, if you chop it finely (and pull the leaves off the twiggy stems) you won't notice it when you eat it.
I think the "regular" ones are brown and the green ones are the little French lentils.
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