Recipes for broke, exhausted writers: Week #2
Another recipe for your preptober and nanowrimo sustenance
As I head deeper into preptober and the solitude of my writer cave, the weather seems to be getting in the spirit of things. Today it’s cloudy and colder outside than it looks.
Here in Colorado, we are about to go from needing a light hoodie in the chill of early morning to the potential for sub zero temps and sudden blizzards. Halloween is a gamble. Sometimes it’s near balmy, sometimes the trick or treaters need ice skates.
Right now though, things are perfect — no longer warm, but not yet frigid — which has put me in the mood for a comforting fall soup.
Much like last week’s chili recipe, Lentil Soup is quick, inexpensive, modifiable in dozens of ways, freezable, and near impossible to mess up. It’s best with a hunk of good sourdough or your favorite crackers (as is true for pretty much all soup) and is also much improved with a few dashes of whatever hot sauce you like best.
If you want to get a pot of lentil soup going alongside me today, here’s what you need to do.
Lentil Soup
Ingredients to gather:
Lots of garlic. It’s just as good here as it was in the chili. I used my jar of pre-chopped garlic again, the equivalent of about 5-6 cloves.
A glug of olive oil or your preferred cooking fat.
Veggies: I used two stalks of celery and two carrots, both chopped. If you’re going for peak simplicity you can also use one of those frozen bags of pre-chopped soup vegetables. You can also throw in an onion, but if you’ve been reading along so far, you know how I feel about them. Use your best judgment.
6 cups of broth, chicken or veggie, or enough water and bouillon to make six cups. I used chicken-flavor Better than Bouillon, but use whatever you prefer as long as you know it also tastes good on its own. The broth is responsible for most of the flavor in this soup, which is a big, important job, so don’t go for the crappy cheap stuff. Use a broth you can trust.
One can of petite diced tomatoes. You may be sensing a theme in my tomato preferences based on the last recipe. If so, you would be correct. I prefer tiny tomatoes. Tomatoes are optional in this recipe, however. This soup also tastes good with just broth, but if you leave the tiny tomatoes out you’ll need to add an extra cup of broth to make up for the loss of liquid, and possibly a bit more vinegar for acidity.
1 and ½ cups of dried brown lentils. I know there are other types of lentils, but I haven’t tried to make this soup with them. If you use a different color lentil, you’re on your own. As much as I like to keep things simple, you do probably want to rinse your lentils and check for tiny rocks. If there’s one way to ruin your soup, it is to accidentally leave a surprise pebble in it.
Seasonings: garlic powder, onion powder, and pepper to taste. Add anything else you like. Curry powder is great in this, as are turmeric and ginger. Whatever tickles your fancy. You probably want to wait to add salt until the very end, depending on how salty your broth is. My soup did not end up needing any salt at all.
1-2 tsp of vinegar. Red wine or apple cider works well, but use any vinegar you've got on hand. This ingredient is essential. Don’t skip it. Lemon juice also works in a pinch, but if you leave it out altogether your soup will be sad and boring. Don’t say I didn't warn you.
Ingredient(s) to add at the end of cooking:
About 1 cup fresh or frozen chopped spinach. Today I used frozen, but fresh does taste better if you’ve got it on hand.
Optional modification: for a heartier soup, you can add some kind of meat. Today I added boneless skinless chicken thighs to the soup. You could do that, or you could also add some kind of pre-cooked sausage, like kielbasa, or a vegetarian sausage. If it’s raw, add it right after you sweat the veggies. If it’s pre-cooked, add it toward the end before you add the spinach. If you’re on a budget, the soup is just as good without it.
Once you’ve gathered your ingredients, get out the the crock pot if you’ve got one, or if not, the same dutch oven or stew pot you used for the chili.
Turn your crockpot on high, or your dutch oven on low. Add your glug of olive oil and your garlic and veggies (the carrots and celery, possible onion, or your bagged frozen veg).
The veggies will need a bit of time to sweat and add flavor, so while that’s happening, you might unload the dishwasher, do a bit of reading, transfer the clothes from the washer to the drier, or check your schedule to make sure you’re not accidentally missing a meeting.
After about 20-ish mins in the crockpot or 10-ish on the stovetop, you’re ready to add everything else, minus the spinach. Just dump it all in then stir it a bit. Maybe you’re in the mood to pretend to be one of the witches from Macbeth today, and if so, this is the right time to mutter your incantations.
Your crockpot can stay on high if you’d like to eat in 2-3 hours, or be switched to low if it’s going to sit most of the day, during which you are perhaps engaged in prewriting and outlining your novel, or staring out the window and daydreaming, or finishing up the laundry while you talk yourself through thorny plot issues, all of which count as appropriate preptober activities.
Your dutch oven can be brought up to a boil, then reduced to a simmer and covered. It will be ready in about 45 minutes or so – check it and stir every so often to make sure there’s still enough liquid and nothing is sticking to the bottom.
After the aforementioned times have passed, check your lentils. Once they’re soft, and about 10-ish minutes before you’re ready to eat, add your spinach. Give it a bit to thaw or wilt, then taste your soup. You might want a bit more vinegar, or some more spices.
Serve with bread or crackers, a bottle of hot sauce for the spicy people in your household, and maybe a salad on the side if you’re feeling fancy. I ate mine with crackers and hot sauce in a big bowl while watching Power Rangers: Cosmic Fury with my son, and it was an extremely satisfying experience.