Virtual Vegan Potluck – Ginger Carrot Soup

I know what you were thinking….when is the next Virtual Vegan Potluck? Well, it is YOUR lucky day. VVP is TODAY! The VVP is an online party that happens twice a year where food bloggers share PLANT-BASED recipes (of course) in any one of eight courses. We’ve been eating an obscene amount of soup in our home lately due to the dreary, drizzly, midwestern weather we are enduring in the mitten state so I didn’t have to go far for this recipe selection.

The coolest thing about the VVP is the linking up of every blog via the “back” (Vegan Runner Eats) and “forward” (Quinoa Kale and Exhale) buttons on the bottom of each blog in the Potluck. You are welcome for providing you with the opportunity for entering this veggie wormhole! Be sure to visit my friends in the other categories of course, but soup…soup is where it’s at. Click the buttons below for delish noms for the fall/winter months. I know you are spending most of you work time browsing the web for Thanksgiving meal ideas anyway, so why not hang out in the potluck for a while?

I make a trek to Whole Foods Ann Arbor every so often and the first thing I usually grab from the produce section is a 5 pound bag of their organic carrots. I do this to 1) remind myself that baby carrots are not really a carrot, 2) that I love the serene process of preparing veggies for consuming (i.e. peeling, chopping, etc), and 3) that carrots have a TASTE. Yes. An. Actual. Taste. You don’t get a whole lotta taste from those Dole carrots at my local supermarket. You just don’t.

While scouring the Interwebs for delish recipes I often find that I like certain elements of multiple recipes, or a regular recipe that could stand to be veganized, and so I collect them, mix them up and then execute delish, satisfying, warm-in-your-belly soup.

• 2 pounds carrots, peeled and diced small for fast cooking
• 1 tsp garlic powder or 2 medium cloves garlic, minced
• 1-2 tsp onion powder or 1 large yellow onion, chopped
• 2 tsp curry powder (I did 1 tsp hot, 1 tsp sweet)
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1-2 T fresh chopped ginger or 1 tsp ground ginger (the fresh gives it a certain lively flavor in your mouth and a lot of zip!)
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp garam marsala (optional)
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 5-6 C water (you want all of your carrots covered with liquid to start)
• 2 veg boullion cubes
• 1 can (14-16 oz) nondairy milk (in keeping with the spice theme above, I chose light coconut milk)
• fine grain sea salt (as much as you need)

Process your carrots by peeling and chopping into uniform chunks so they cook at the same rate.

If using real garlic, onion, and or ginger heat a stock pot add 1 T of water and drop in raw ingredients. Heat until transluscent over medium heat careful not to burn fresh garlic. After your fresh ingredients are cooked through, or if not using fresh garlic, onion, and/or ginger, next drop carrots into stock pot followed by all other ingredients and bring mix to a gentle boil. Reduce heat to simmer or low and cook the soup until the carrots are tender. Remove from heat and let cool.

If you wish to puree the soup with a hand blender you can probably get away with blending right in the pot off the heat with some care so as not to splash molten carrot on yourself. If using a blender, be careful as you transfer hot liquids and above all consider the pressure factor in putting hot liquids in a covered blender. I will leave a part of the lid open and cover with a towel lightly so as to avoid an explosion. With either method, you control the consistency with additional water, veg broth, or as one blog suggested, orange juice! Taste and season with salt or more curry after your soup is pureed.

Some of the recipes I viewed suggested a squeeze of lemon after puree to bring out a lightness in the soup. Others finish with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, lemon oil, nut oils, sesame oil or chili oil. We love our carbs at the Wallace-DeVries home, so instead of oil, we finished this soup with Naan 🙂

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Ideas for this mashup come from: The Curvy Carrot, Eat Live Run, Whole Foods,  Simply Recipes, Mind Body Green, and May I Have That Recipe.