Pumpkin (and Chicken) Soup

 

 

 

Ingredients

1 kg pumpkin or butternut squash cut into 1 cm cubes

3 medium onions chopped

3 fat cloves garlic  finely chopped

2 seasoning peppers finely chopped

1 green chilli pepper finely chopped

1 stalk celery chopped

350 g breadfruit (or sweet potato) cut into 1 cm cubes

100g (1/2 cup) red lentils

180 g (3 medium) carrot coarsely chopped

1 litre water

2 tbsp olive oil

salt and pepper

2 chicken breasts cut into 1 cm cubes (eliminate for vegetarian and vegan option)

Method

Soften the onions in the olive oil then add the garlic and peppers. After 2 or 3 minutes, add the peppers and celery. Stir to make sure nothing sticks. Toss in the pumpkin and breadfruit and stir thoroughly to coat in the “seasonings” Add the water and tip in the red lentils. You need to use some judgement here as to whether you have enough water.

You could stop at this point and have a delicious vegetarian/vegan pumpkin soup, or you could add the chicken bits and cook for a further 20 minutes.

Whichever option you choose, you can either leave this as a chunky soup, or make it smooth using a wand blender or “zjupper” as my daughter Kirsty says. As you can see from the photo above, I choose smooth.