I’m always trying to do a pumpkin soup like Mum’s Thai Spiced Butternut soup – I never get it quite right though. This soup I made is completely different! 🙂 But it turned out very well.

Vegetables:

• 1 kg – Carnival Pumpkin (Butternut should do)
• 1 medium – Brown Onion
• 1 medium – Red Onion
• 4 small – Parsnips
• 2 large – Carrots
• 5 cloves – Garlic

Spices:

• 3 stars – Star Anise
• ½ tbsp – Ground Allspice
• ½ tbsp – Hot Chilli Powder
• ½ tbsp – Ground Coriander Seed
• 1 tsp – Ground Cinnamon
• 1 tsp – Ground Cumin Seed
• 1 tsp – Ground Turmeric
• 10 – Cardamom Pods
• 10 – Kaffir Lime Leaves
• 80g – Coriander Leaf

Liquids:

• 3 tbsp – Peanut Oil
• 1 400g tin – Coconut Milk
• 2 litres – Chicken Stock

As usual with soup the process of manufacture is simple:

Boil some water in a kettle and pour over kaffir lime leaves in a teacup.
Peel garlic cloves and slice. Peel where necessary and chop vegetables into ~1 inch chunks.
Heat oil in a large pot, when a little hot (not really hot or you’ll end up with burnt spices) stir in all the dry spices. Should be aromatic, not burning!
When spices nicely mixed through the oil throw in the onion and garlic and sautée until translucent but not browned. Then throw in all remaining vegetables and toss until well coated with the oil.
Tip in coconut milk (reserve a little for later), kaffir lime leaves (with water) and the stock so that stock covers about 1 inch over vegetables (more stock = thinner soup, so add more/less as you prefer). Bring to boil then reduce heat to a simmer.
Cover and simmer until vegetables are soft, around 30 minutes should be fine.
Turn off heat and let cool (another 30 mins should do).
Fish out kaffir lime leaves, cardamom pods and star anise (or don’t – I only bothered fishing out the leaves).
Purée in batches in a food processor.
Finely chop the coriander and stir through the soup, keep a little for decoration. At this point add salt “to taste”.
Serve with a sprinkling of coriander and a swirl of coconut milk.

This recipe made us about 10 medium serves of soup. (We make soup on weekends and have soup for dinner three days a week, usually there are two types of soup in the freezer at any given time.)