Taste & Create: Broccoli Soup

Did you know that in Sweden it is traditional to have soup on Thursdays? Specifically; yellow split pea soup because yellow split peas are associated with Thor and Thursday is, after all Thor's Day!

This recipe is not for yellow spilt pea soup. This recipe is for Broccoli Soup. This is because we had approximately a million (AKA 2) broccolis and no spilt peas (I used them making soup for last Thursday!)...

This soup that I made for Taste & Create this month is simple, tasty, vegan (if you let it be, I didn't) and requires very few ingredients. It's fantastic for Students and Real People alike! It also came out the most fantastic shade of green:

See?

I fried the cumin seeds and garlic in butter as PJ of Seduce Your Tastebuds recommended in butter because I like butter. And I think garlic tastes better fried in butter, over oil... But, as oil is such an easy substitute; I still think it's fair to store this recipe as a vegan option.

The potato gives the blended soup a creamy texture without the addition of milk or cream. PJ pressure cooks her potatoes and broccoli; but I don't have a pressure cooker in my student kitchen so I boiled my potato and steamed the broccoli over it... Feel free, however to boil your broccoli and potato together; bearing in mind that the broccoli won't need quite so long to cook as the potato and over-cooked broccoli is a kinda funky colour...

I really enjoyed this soup, and hope you do too!


You'll need:

1 potato, cubed and rinsed (I didn't bother peeling mine, 'cause I'd be blitzing the soup eventually)
1 broccoli, cut into florets
(you can use the stem too, cut it into pieces a similar size to your potato cubes)

1 clove garlic, chopped
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp butter

Salt/Pepper to taste

Cook the potato and broccoli until soft, but still green (in the case of the broccoli) and almost mashable (in the case of the potato). Drain (reserve the liquid) and set aside.

Meanwhile fry up the cumin and garlic in a little butter or oil.

Put the potato, broccoli and fried cumin/garlic/butter in a blender and blitz with enough hot water/veggie cooking liquid/stock to make a soup of a thickness to your taste.

At this point, season to taste and serve with hot crusty bread and (I like) a crumble of blue cheese!