Some lentil soup I made tonight, with onions, carrots, celery, carrots, pickles, & kale.
Recipe
Okay, here’s how I cooked it:
2 cups uncooked lentils
1 cup brown basmati rice
8 cups water
1 onion chopped
2 carrots chopped
2 celery stalks chopped
2-3 large leaves of kale chopped
3-4 large dill pickles chopped
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 bay leaves
1-2 teaspoons salt (I use Celtic sea salt)
~ 2 teaspoons white vinegar
Mix all ingredients except the vinegar in a large pot & bring to a boil, then simmer covered until the lentils are soft, about an hour usually. Then add the vinegar. This makes enough of a very thick soup to feed several people, or several meals for one or two people.
This is based on a recipe for Greek lentil soup I learned long ago from Laurel’s Kitchen (famous vegetarian cookbook originally published 1976); main differences is I tend to use about twice as much veggies as the original called for, & I added in the rice & the kale (or any other dark leafy green), & I leave out the potato b/c I seldom have any on hand (I don’t eat much potato b/c it’s high glycemic). I also added the pickles, which I use a lot to add a flavor variation to various dishes.
Note that by the end of cooking, the kale will be quite a different shade of green than in the photo above, which was taken at a fairly early stage of the cooking. You can keep it closer to this bright shade of green by adding it closer to the end, but don’t wait until the very last minute: some of the good (nutritional) stuff in kale (& some other leafy greens) isn’t fully bioavailable when it’s too uncooked.
Variations: Add more water if you want a thinner soup (or lower the amount of veggies). You can skip the rice or use a different kind of rice if you want, or use different vegetables or different quantities of vegetables. For example, potato, turnip, any dark leafy greens. Fresh tomatoes (which I like best added near the end, so they aren’t as cooked). If you’re not a vegetarian, you can also add some meat — my favorites are well-browned bison stew meat or precooked boneless ham. Tofu might be good in there too, but I’ve never tried it.
Like most soups made with beans/legumes, this (1) easy to make — most of the work is just chopping up the veggies; & (2) you can vary it a lot based on what you have on hand in the way of vegetables or type of beans/legumes. Just be aware that some types of beans/legumes take a lot longer to cook than lentils, & may need to be soaked overnight before cooking. But lentils are really fast; blackeyed peas are pretty fast too.
