Dieters Delight - Red Pumpkin Soup

Recipe adapted from Susan Deborah. Susan gave me a recipe this morning and I modified it slightly to suit my tastes.

My dinners over the last few evenings have been soups. So I am always on the look out for interesting recipes. (If you do know some, please feel free to share)

Ingredients:

Red Pumpkin (aka butternut squash aka parangikka) - cubed - 1 cup
Carrot - 1 - roughly chopped
Onion - 1 med - diced
Ginger garlic paste - 1 tsp (If this is not available, you add peeled ginger and 1 clove garlic)
Oil / Butter - 1 tsp
Coriander powder - As per taste (I used about 1/2 tbsp)
Bay Leaf - 1
Pepper corns - 5-6 (change as per taste)
Salt - To taste

Recipe:

Heat oil / butter in a pan and add bay leaf, onions and ginger garlic paste. Saute until onions are soft. Add pepper corns, coriander power and mix well. Add the vegetables and saute until they are coated with the oil. Pressure cook. I used an electric cooker and cooked these for about 20 minutes. Remove the bay leaf.

Cool and puree in a blender. Strain and heat through once again.

Note: The same recipe can be made with bottle gourd. 

Dieters Delight - Shorabit Adas

The soup made of red lentils - a very traditional Middle Eastern recipe - is loaded with goodness. It's extremely simple to make, not to mention very tasty. There are various recipes to this, but what's given here is the simplest of all, made with the ingredients readily available.

Ingredients (Serves 1)

Red Lentils (Masoor dal) - 1/4 cup
Onion - 1/2 - chopped
Garlic - 1 clove
Cumin - 1 tsp
Salt - to taste
Oil - 1 tsp
Water - 1 1/4 cup
Mint leaves - few

Optional: (these are variations and I didn't use them in my recipe)
Carrots - 1 chopped
Red Pumpkin (parangikkai) - 1/2 cup chopped

Recipe:

Heat the oil in a pan, add the cumin and saute for a few seconds. Add onions, garlic and saute for a minute. Add the washed red lentils and let it absorb the flavor of the onions and garlic. (At this point you can add the vegetables) Add salt. Add the water and pressure cook until soft. (I used an electric cooker and cooked for 20 minutes). Puree this in a blender.

Strain through a sieve. You won't have much of a residue. Return this back to the stove and heat through gently.

This is typically served with warm bread :-)

Dieter's Delight - Lemon Coriander Soup and Stuffed Mushrooms

Day 3 of intensive cooking and dieting and working out and it has been a success. With the taste buds suddenly craving for mushroom, I'd decided to make lemon coriander soup and some stuffed mushrooms for dinner.

I finished prep and cooking in under 45 minutes, and in between some cleaning as well. So, that's how easy this is.

This soup recipe serves 1 (Adapted from Tarla Dalal Healthy Soups and Salads)

Boil about 500 ml of water, along with some chopped carrots, lemon grass (I used the dried variety), roughly chopped onions, some pepper corns, a few mint leaves, a teeny bit of salt, and some ginger. Boil this for about 15- 20 mins, on simmer, until the aroma is released and the broth is flavorful. Strain and set aside.

Chop some mushrooms, cabbage, spring onions (save the green for garnish later), carrots and saute in a teeny weeny bit of oil. To this add salt, and add the broth. Cook on simmer until the the vegetables are tender yet slightly crunchy. Add plenty coriander, the green of the spring onions, and a liberal dosage of lemon (depending on how tangy you like it - remember there's already some lemongrass in there).

Meanwhile, boil some sprouts in a microwave, on high for 5 minutes. Clean the mushrooms and remove the stem. Dry the mushrooms on a clean kitchen towel. Chop the stems & some onions. Saute on high heat for a few seconds; To this add the boiled sprouts, and some salt. Saute until they mix well. Add chopped coriander and mint. Brush the mushrooms with a little olive oil (remember mushrooms let out a lot of water, and they usually are basted), stuff the sprout mix inside the mushrooms. You can either bake them in the oven (if you are the lucky one and own an oven) or put them on a pan, on low heat, until it's cooked through but doesn't fall apart. (Or microwave on high for about 4 minutes, making sure the heat is even across all the pieces - that means you need to keep checking at regular intervals)


I made some mint yoghurt dip to go along with this (but that's not in the picture because I was in a hurry to eat and the picture was shot when the mushrooms were cooking).

Dieter's Delight - Vegetable Stir Fry Clear Soup

The dieter's delight series will continue with tonight's dinner.

After some cardio and weights, and some unscheduled customer calls (which I didn't take too kindly to), I was terribly hungry and quickly put together this soup. (Adapted from Tarla Dalal Healthy Soups and Salads book)

Finely slice capsicum, cabbage (I used the white and purple variety, for the dash of color) and spring onions.
Grind together a bulb of garlic and a green chilli.
Heat a sauce pan, with a little oil. Add the chilli garlic paste and saute on high heat for a few seconds, just until the aroma is released.
Add the vegetables, salt and stir fry. (I learnt to do this without the ladle :-))
Pour about 2 cups of hot water, squeeze a few drops of lemon and let it boil for a few minutes, until the flavor spreads through. Just throw in some chopped coriander and we are done!

The broth is extremely flavorful (and perhaps can be used as stock for other soups), and the vegetables were crispy - just like how a stir fry should be.

A cozy evening, Hercule Poirot and Oven roasted tomato soup

When the work day turns out decent and you get a day off mid-week, the kitchen beckons. Having actually ignored the kitchen for a long while now, I decided to make some soup for dinner. Oh yeah, what's so great about making a soup? Nothing, really. It's simple and just gives you that warm feeling.

So, I just dump about 4 big tomatoes (cored), 1 piece of garlic, half a chopped onion, drizzled with olive oil, salt and pepper into the oven at 450 deg, for about 25 minutes. Boil water (you can use stock, if you like), add butter, bay leaves and some mint. Add the caramelized tomatoes, onion, garlic, and let boil. Simmer for a few minutes. Let cool a bit and blend in a processor. Strain the puree, and simmer on low heat.

Garnish with cream (if you are not on a diet ;-) )

Transfer to a soup bowl, and eat to your hearts content. Yummy, simple and filling.

(And yes, I'm now reading Hercule Poirot, The complete short stories collection)

And yes, this is the cute little owl timer that S got! :D :D I so love this owl, he's cute, isn't he! :)