pumpkin soup recipe

I thought I'd share my recipe for pumpkin soup, since it turned out so well. I got it off the internet and it's a pretty standard recipe that you can easily modify to suit your taste.

Pumpkin soup

2T olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 leek, white part only
1 garlic clove, crushed
herbs or spices of your choice (see below)
1kilo (just over 2 pounds) pumpkin, peeled, diced
1 large potato, peeled, diced
1L (about 1 quart) chicken stock (I use powdered stock! and it tastes great)

Slice the leek in half lengthwise and rinse well between layers - leeks are very sandy and you don't want that in your soup. Thinly slice across the leeks and heat in saucepan with oil and onion over low heat for a few minutes until softened but not coloured. Add garlic and herbs/spices and stir through for 30 seconds. Add pumpkin, potato and stock and bring to a boil. Turn heat to low, cover and simmer 30 minutes. Allow to cool slightly then blend in batches.

As I said this recipe is easy to modify. Pumpkin can be matched with many herbs spices - a bay leaf is a good basic start. Rosemary or sage are lovely, as is a bit of nutmeg. Or you can go exotic and use cumin, coriander or even curry powder. Just don't over-do it, 1/2t dried or 1t fresh at a time is plenty. I used a smidge more garlic than the recipe called for, plus 1t chopped fresh sage and it was divine.

For the pumpkin, whatever you do, don't use American-style jack-o-lantern pumpkins, they're watery and tasteless. Look for a cooking pumpkin with a really thick layer of flesh, or if in doubt use butternut squash (but not acorn or spaghetti squash), though butternut is a sweet pumpkin. You can even replace the potato with a sweet potato but again, it'll make a fairly sweet soup which wasn't to my liking when I tried doing that.

You can also fry up a bit of chopped bacon or pancetta at the start, though personally I dislike using the whole "bacon bone". You can also add a bit of cream either at the end to thicken, or a dab of cream or yogurt when you serve.

Oh by the way, peeling and chopping up 1 kilo of pumpkin takes FOREVER.