Cream of Carrot Soup

cream of carrot soup
Cream of Carrot Soup

I love carrots – after parsnips, they are my favorite root vegetable (apart from potatoes, sweet potatoes, and those kinds of tubers) to roast. Whenever I see crudités, I head for the carrots first. I’ve eaten more than my share of carrots at recital receptions, and I never tire of them. I do find packaged “baby carrots” to be a bit amusing – big carrots whittled down to become small carrots (I have no idea how they do it exactly). Actual baby carrots right out of the ground are a totally different creature and are sweet like candy.

I made a carrot cake the other day, from Heidi Swanson’s 101 Cookbooks site. It’s a wonderful cake, very earthy and sweetened with bananas and dates – there’s no refined sugar (or unrefined sugar, actually – it’s just fruit sweetened) in this carrot cake. It’s one of my favorite things about this cake.

carrot cake
Carrot cake from 101 Cookbooks

I did make a maple syrup sweetened mascarpone frosting for it, but after tasting the whole shebang, I found it made the whole thing too sweet, so I scraped a lot of it off.  There’s only a thin layer now, and it’s perfect.

After I made this carrot cake, I had a bunch of carrots left over, so I decided to make soup out of them. I whipped up this cream of carrot soup the other day and it turned out to be simply amazing. It’s basically carrots and onions cooking in milk and then pureed. Cooking vegetables in milk and pureeing them is one of my base recipes – it works well with broccoli, cauliflower, root vegetables, and even dark leafy greens.

My bet is that one could make this dairy free by using homemade almond milk in place of the cow’s milk. Carrots and almonds go so well together. Maybe garnishing the soup with dukkah would be nice in that case, too!

Cream of Carrot Soup

1/4 white onion, preferably organic, chopped
carrots, preferably organic, washed and grated enough to make 1.5 cups
1 tbs unsalted grass-fed butter (I like using Kerrygold)
1 tbs extra virgin olive oil
juice from 1/2 orange
1/2 tsp coarse sea salt/kosher salt
1/4 tsp Aleppo pepper/red pepper flakes
2 c. whole milk (mine is raw, but any kind of grass-fed milk would work just fine)
salt and pepper to taste
whole milk yogurt (I used raw yogurt, but regular whole milk yogurt would work, as would strained yogurt)
za’atar (optional, but delicious; fresh thyme leaves would be an alternative)

Melt butter in a medium saucepan, then add the chopped onion. Cook for a few minutes until softened, and add the grated carrots. Cook for a few minutes until they soften, too.

Add the olive oil and stir until combined. Squeeze half the juice of the orange (so, juice from 1/4 of an orange) onto the onions and carrots. Add salt and sprinkle on the Aleppo pepper.

Add the milk and combine everything in the pan together. Turn the heat down on low (do not let this mixture boil), put a lid on the pan, and simmer for 20-30 minutes until everything is soft. Note: you may have to place the lid on the pan at an angle if things are too hot, to let the steam out, and so as to not cause over-boiling (milk burns easily and smells terrible when it does).

Take the pan off the heat and blend everything in the pot with a stick blender (you could do this with a regular blender, too, but it’s just more work). Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Ladle into bowls and top with yogurt and za’atar (optional) to taste and squeeze a little more orange juice onto the soup.

Serves 1-2 people.

This post is participating in Real Food Wednesday hosted by Kelly the Kitchen Kop.

Lacto Fermented Ginger Carrots

Lacto fermented ginger carrots is one of my favorite ferments.  It’s got the sweetness of the carrots, the piquant nature of the ginger, and the tanginess that comes with fermented foods.  Plus all that extra vitamin C and probiotics from the fermentation process.

The jar of ginger carrots in the photo was made during a fermentation workshop I taught a couple of weeks ago.  I decided on ginger carrots because they are easy to make and get one’s head around – a few simple ingredients, easy to mix, and easy to get a brine out of it. It was fun to prepare them as a group, too, with everyone contributing to the grating and mincing. And I learned how to peel ginger with a spoon!  It’s freakishly effective.

I enjoy ginger carrots on lots of things, from eggs, to roast salmon, and it’s a nice snack all by itself. It also goes great in a bean salad, the recipe for which I’ll share soon

The process is very simple – mix everything together and let it sit and ferment.  The ferment shown in the picture above – which was made during the fermentation workshop I taught a few weeks ago – took about 6 days to get to my liking. It continues to get better and better as it ages, too.

CSA Bounty – Week Six

CSA Bounty Week Six

This week we got a wonderful variety of vegetables in our veggie share, and some delicious stone fruit in the fruit share.  I decided to display them in a grid this time.  From top to bottom row, left to right:

lettuce, green beans, spring onions, carrots, cucumbers, plums, nectarines, peaches, mint.

I forgot to take a picture of the zucchini!  This week I got a large one, which I’ll use to put in zucchini muffins most likely.  The zucchini from last week went into zucchini fritters.  I’ll post about them at some point, after I tweak a few things.

distribution on a humid cool day

The weather was better than last week – not great, but better.  It was much cooler, thanks to thunderstorms that passed through this afternoon.  It’s still humid, though, and a heat wave is expected this weekend.  I have hopes that it won’t be as intense as last time.

I have plans to make a sorbet out of some of the stone fruit.  Perfect for hot weather!

Additionally, I got a chunk of chevre and some ground pastured beef.  Looking forward to having hamburgers tomorrow!

And finally, our dry bean and grain share was this week and the most striking thing was the oats.  I don’t think I’ve actually seen whole oats before.  They look perfect to sprout – I’ll have to look into a grain mill attachment for my Kitchen Aid.  Or, perhaps I will eat them as hot cereal.  I also came across a recipe for a sprouted oat milk, which is intriguing.

Jerusalem Artichoke Fritters

plated

[This post is based upon a post I wrote for the Hellgate CSA blog earlier this week.]

So, our CSA started up this week – I am so happy about this!  We have six months of beautiful, local, organic produce ahead of us, and I can’t wait to see what the season will bring.

This week I was intrigued by the inclusion of jerusalem artichokes in our initial season share (I thought for sure we’d get radishes!). I didn’t want to eat them raw, nor did I want to roast them, so I searched the internet for something interesting and tasty-sounding. I found that in these jerusalem artichoke fritters, which I prepared Tuesday night.

in the pan

I loved them! The combination of the jerusalem artichokes, carrots, and shallots is lovely, and the chive-lime sour cream is wonderful – this is some seriously good sauce. These fritters are easy to put together and take only about a half hour, start to finish, to make.

cooked fritters

I was also happy to be able to use some of my Cayuga Organics cornmeal in them as well! Sprouted wheat flour worked perfectly in place of conventional white flour, so I was pleased by this adjustment.

Jerusalem Artichoke Fritters
Lightly adapted from the New York Times

While grating them, the jerusalem artichokes oxidize quickly, so don’t be alarmed by dark coloring that appears after grating.

1/2 pound jerusalem artichokes, scrubbed
1 carrot, peeled
3 shallots, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons yellow cornmeal
1/4 cup sprouted wheat flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
Fresh black pepper to taste
hot sauce to taste
2 eggs
3 tablespoons chopped chives
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
Oil for frying (coconut oil would be wonderful)

Heat oven to 250 degrees. Grate Jerusalem artichokes and carrot into a mixing bowl. Add shallots. Stir together cornmeal, flour, salt and baking powder, and stir in, mixing well. Season with pepper and hot sauce to taste. Add eggs, and mix thoroughly.

Combine chives, sour cream and lime juice, and set aside.

Pour oil into a large skillet, so that it just covers the bottom of the pan. Heat over medium-high heat until sizzling. Drop mixture in by tablespoons, flattening slightly. Fry until crisp and golden brown, turning once. Transfer to oven on a baking sheet lined with paper towel while frying more. Serve with sour cream mixture.

Yield: 4 servings.

Raw Carrot Apple Salad

Have you ever made a dish that crazy exceeded your expectations?  I have, and it comes in the form of a raw carrot apple salad.  These two simple ingredients, when mixed together with some citrus juices and a few spoonfuls of currants, are transformed into a wonderful salad that is refreshing and delicious.

carrot apple salad smiling

Mixing carrots and apples together is a classic approach.  I can remember numerous potlucks from my youth that featured a carrot apple salad, more often than not laced with jello or mayonnaise (or possibly even Miracle Whip), sometimes with pineapple or pecans added.

The jello ones were never finished.

carrots and apples

lemon zest

This salad has none of those creamy, fruity, or nutty extras in it.  Its beauty is in its simplicity.

According to the cookbook Sundays at the Moosewood, this salad is Czech in origin.  In that book, the dish is called apple and carrot confetti.  No matter what you call it, it’s delicious.

carrot apple salad

So, I’m fond of taking this carrot apple salad to potlucks, especially in the summertime.  It’s naturally vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, raw, and sugar-free, so it caters to almost any dietary restriction you might encounter.  It’s also light and refreshing, and goes well with light summer fare. It even is suitable for brunch!

Raw Carrot Apple Salad

I have left out the sugar that was indicated in the original recipe; I find that this salad really doesn’t need it. If you wish it to be sweeter, best to use a sweeter apple.

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons fresh orange juice
2 cups grated apples (about 4)
2 cups grated carrots
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
2 tablespoons currants
1/4 teaspoon salt, to taste

Combine lemon and orange juice in a large bowl.  Grate the apples directly into the citrus juices to avoid oxidation of the apples.  Toss the apples with the rest of the ingredients and serve immediately.