Saturday, December 27, 2008

Recipe of the day: Vegan Split Pea Soup

This has been a cold and snowy December here in Portland. This kind of weather makes me feel like I'm back in Michigan. And it makes me long for warm hearty soups. Today's soup is Vegan Split Pea. As a kid I hated split pea soup. I think it's because my mother was a dreadful cook! Somehow she managed to make just about everything taste like the smell of dried dog food. I've recently tried split pea soup again, the canned variety, and have liked it very much. So I set out to create my own recipe. I think it's pretty darn good!

6 cups of water or veggie stock
1 veggie boullion cube (use only if using water rather than stock)
2 cups split peas
1 inch piece of kombu sea vegetable
2 Tbs. olive oil
2 onions chopped into small pieces
1 carrot peeled and chopped into small pieces
1 celery rib chopped into small pieces
3 cloves of garlic minced
1 Tbs. dried basil
1 Tbs. salt
2 tsp. black pepper

Saute onions, garlic, carrot and celery in olive oil for about 5 minutes. Add to a large stock pot. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 45 minutes or until peas are soft-ish. Remove about 3/4 of the soup from the pot and blend in a blender or food processor until smooth. You may need to do this in batches. Stir back into pot and stir together with remaining soup. Enjoy!

Oh! I've recently discovered Baconsalt™. It's vegan and it's great sprinkled over this soup!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

They claim it's only the hickory flavor of the Bacon Salt that's really vegan, although I have doubts that they've really sourced the lactic acid to a vegan source.