Red Lentil Soup

Prep: not bad at all for soup

Time: pretty fast for soup!
Taste: ended up great!
From: first from reading food.com recipes and NYT recipes, then my brain, because it needed to be fixed
Note: this requires a food processor or immersion blender for best results

Red Lentil Soup


So I was reading some stupid Buzzfeed list this morning about food that "you should eat because they have vitamins" (um, duh, all fruits, vegetables, and beans have vitamins- whereas meat does not- did you know that? well, it has B12, but that's it), and RED LENTILS caught my eye, as I haven't eaten them in MONTHS and I was obsessed with them last February! SO, here is what I came up with from random ingredients I had in my kitchen, because, I did not have time to go to the store, I wanted this soup ASAP:
In large soup pot, cook up (I didn't use oil- just water- came out great):
OK- here is where I have to be honest. I hate tumeric. But according to Pinterest, it can solve all my problems and save my life (this only makes sense if you a Pinterest person... other things that can solve all your problems and save your life are: mason jars, wood pallets, modge podge, and leftover juices from canned beans). SO, I don't like tumeric  but I'm trying. And a half teaspoon seemed like a good place to start.
After about a 20 minutes, I tasted the soup. I hated it. It was... really bad. So, I thought back to the red lentil soups I liked last year (Wegmans prepared red lentil soup was DIVINE), and then added:
19 cherry tomatoes, chopped (hey, it's all I had)
After simmering that just a few more minutes, I put it all in a food processor and pulsed until kinda smooth, but not too smooth. IT WAS DELICIOUS. Interesting fact- red lentils actually are kind of high on the "bean calorie" scale, so- don't go nuts eating the entire batch in one sitting. Sometimes with soup, I am very tempted to do this. But, this entire batch equals about 800 calories, and can reasonably be split into 3 or 4 large servings. 


1/2 red onion, diced
3 carrots, chopped
1 sad celery stick, 
chopped
4 cloves of garlic, minced

After stirring and sautéing them up, add:
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1 cup rinsed dried red lentils
4 cups of water (I did this in two batches- 2 cups at a time after a few minutes of simmering in between)



1 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1 teaspoon salt