There is an old saying in Spanish that establishes that lentils are food for old ladies, and you can either eat them or not, but the words didn't rhyme in English so I tried to adapt it, with a very poor result.
Lentils aren't easily loved. Kids usually hate them, and adults tolerate them in sake of their health, but not a lot of people actually likes to eat them. I think its probably because of their texture and the way of cooking them. The most common recipes, at least in Spain, have very strong flavours that are, sometimes, a bit overwhelming for our palates. They are also cooked with lard and bacon, and that gives a weird fatty texture that, at least for a child is, incredibly gross.
I love lentils, I've been eating them since I was really small, but never, in the fifteen years I spent eating at school, I was able to suppress a nausea while avoiding the grey lumps of lard. Yikes!
They're also difficult to digest and maybe the uncomfortable gases they generate in our intestines, persuade us from like them.
Nonetheless, I love them, also peas, beans and chickpeas. I enjoy cooking and eating complicated dishes, but sometimes, I relish on the comfort of the simplest stuff.
My favourite way of eating legumes is boiled and drained, dressed with salt, olive oil and vinegar, sometimes sprinkled with sweet paprika.
But today is about my star lentil dish: Lentil vegetarian soup.
I learnt this recipe from my grannie, when I wasn't old enough to seat on a proper chair. I watched her cook this recipe so many times that probably I knew it by heart by the time I cooked it for the first time. I was fourteen.
It was the first days of school holidays, at summer, when my parents were still working and all the cousins were at the countryside house with our grandparents. My grannie had a back ache and was in bed for a week or so, and beign the oldest (and also the most skilled, let's face it ^_^), I was in charge of the meals, under my grannie's orders.
I made my start in serious cooking then, before that all my experience were some cakes and simple baking. To be honest, this soup was the most complicated thing I made, the rest was rice and pasta salad, salads with grilled fish or chicken...and stuff of the like. So, at that moment, it was kind of a big deal.
For me, this soup is my favourite way to eat lentils. It's simple, healthy and tasty. What more can you ask about food? Oh, it's cheap too, so, in a nutshell: Perfect.
So, without further delay, here is the recipe:
INGREDIENTES (remember, always serves four)
320 gr of dry raw lentils
1 medium onion
3 large carrots
1 stick of celery
2 garlic cloves
4 cloves
1 bayleaf
1 tablespoon of black pepper balls (not grounded)
1 tablespoon of sweet paprika
1/2 teaspoon of hot paprika
1/2 teaspoon of grounded cumin (it helps to prevent the gases)
1 L of water
1 cube of vegetable stock
Salt to taste
Vinegar to taste
METHOD
- Chop the onion as tiny as you can.
- Peel the carrots and cut them in four longitudinally, then chop them in tiny cubes.
- Slice finely the celery.
- In a heavy bottom saucepan add the vegetables and cover them with water.
- Let it poach in a medium fire, and add all the herbs and spices, except the paprikas. Stir gently from time to time.
- When the water is almost evaporated, add the paprikas and stir quickly, then add the lentils.
- Add the rest of the water and bring it to the boil. Lower the fire and let it simmer for as long as the package says the lentils need (check also that they don't need to be hydrated beforehand. If they do, and you don't have time to let them hydrate overnight, DON'T PANIC, just put them in a bowl, pour hot water and a teaspoon of bicarbonate, and let it sit for about one hour, then drain them and problem solved).
- At the five final minutes of cooking, check the salt (add more if needed) and the vinegar.
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| Yummy lentils |
