Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Roasted Pumpkin & Caramelized Onion Soup

Well to be truthful it isn't exactly fall like weather in India but it has gotten a bit cool in the mornings and late in the evenings. But this soup is dedicated to my days in NY when I could barely put together a meal to save my life but a warm soup with cheesy bread was a welcome respite during Oct-Mar and I had an open kitchen and my roommate was always hassled about our clothes smelling of food. Now I do not have to worry about things like that and there is always SOME smell wafting from my kitchen - I like my house to smell warm - like cinnamon and spice or like bread baking or freshly baked cookies. The best compliment I did get was from my neighbor sometime back that whenever she opened her house she felt like coming into mine coz of the smells wafting from it.

So I got myself some pumpkin because my baby insisted and I thought I would humor him and then just didn't know what to do with it. Pumpkin or kaddu is usually cooked in a sweet / savory way to be had with pooris in our house but I am just not a poori person. Also, baby didn't like poori and hubby travelling so no one to eat poori and my hubby does run a mile from some veggies I may add that pumpkin is one of them... so I am sitting in my room looking at this huge piece of pumpkin thinking what I can do with it when I decided to roast it whole so it doesn't get spoiled. I just drizzled it with some olive oil and popped it into the oven for an hour at 250. The house suddenly started smelling gorgeous with the smell of roasted pumpkin. Sometime earlier I had sautéed some onion, ginger and garlic for curry and all the smells combined together smelled heavenly... so I decided to just combine them into a soup!

So, everything for this was totally done andaaz se - please follow your nose for this recipe and when it smells right I think you're done :)!

Roasted about 300grams of pumpkin
3 red onions sliced thinly + 3 spring onion bulbs
3-4 big cloves of garlic
4-5 cups vegetable broth

Saute the onions in some olive oil, then add some garlic and salt for seasoning. Cook this mixture down till the onions turn burnt sienna colored and are absolutely caramelised. Add the pumpkin and mash it all up - add some of the broth so that the veggies don't burn. Now puree this and add more broth  - till you like the consistency. I didn't make this soup too thin - 'coz the thickness gives it more flavor and depth. Add a bit of fresh cream to season this if you are not worried about the calories and some brown bread croutons or garlicky cheese bread to make a complete meal out of this! 

And sorry about not putting up pics folks.. I am travelling again - nothing exotic - just visiting my parents.. and I forgot my camera in the hurry of packing all and sundry for my 2 year old... so I have a huge backlog to catch up on!