Bonfire soup
This is one of our all-time favourite soups. A bit different – slightly sweet, extravagant (pine kernels are expensive) and oh so, so satisfying!
We tend to have it on bonfire night, but really, it is so delicious, we should have it throughout the year. When I make this, I always make double this recipe so that we can have it for lunch the next day. My recollection is that it doesn’t freeze all that well though, the texture goes grainy once it has been frozen.
Bonfire soup
Ingredients
1tbsp olive oil
25g butter
2 fat cloves of garlic, chopped
1 large onion, chopped
1kg sweet potatoes
2tsp red Thai curry paste
570 ml (1 pint) hot vegetable stock
1 x 400ml tin of coconut milk (ideally without emulsifiers)
100g of pine nuts
Method
Dry fry the pine nuts in a frying pan until they are just turning golden. I have learnt from bitter experience to pay attention to them, they turn quickly and, to me, they are inedible burnt. Tip them out of the pan into a bowl as soon as they turn golden brown.
Heat the oil and butter in a large pan or stock pot.
Stir in the garlic and the onion and cook gently for 5 minutes, partially covered. Stirring occasionally.
Meanwhile, peel the sweet potatoes and cut them into small cubes. I hate this bit but the effort is worth it.
Stir the curry paste into the onions and then stir in the sweet potatoes.
Pour in the stock and the coconut milk.
Add half of the pine nuts.
Bring the soup to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, covered for 15 minutes or until the sweet potato is tender.
Liquidise until smooth.
Sprinkle the remaining pine nuts onto your bowls of soup (or for bonfire night, mugs of soup) and eat! I frequently forget this stage and then get to eat the left-over toasted pine nuts the next day.
