Coconut & Cardamon Soup

Coconut and Cardamon Soup Print this page

by Azélia on 16/01/2010

in Soup,Starters,Vegetables

This soup came about with the madness of the snow and siege mentally in the shops, people buying everything in sight, at one point I couldn’t get hold of any eggs.  I hadn’t been out for while was running out of everything and these were all the vegetables I had left, sweet potato and leeks,  I was determined to delay visiting the shops and sometimes when needs must, inspiration strikes,  rummaging through the cupboards trying to come up with something for lunch and this was it, it was a hit with the girls.

I had a tin of coconut milk which lead me to think about a lovely soup I had years ago with sweet potato and coconut milk, and from that I wanted a fragrant spice that complimented the coconut.  Cardamon is a king of spices for me, its fragrance is strong but doesn’t overpower dishes like a clove or cinnamon can.  Leeks once cooked breakdown really well giving the soup a silkiness, just like you get in the summer version of  vichyssoise soup.

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Sweet potato, leeks, coconut milk and cardamon, four ingredients made into a lightly fragrant delicious soup that was a hit with the kids.

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In my jar of green cardamon I found three different stages of the cardamon seed; the very black seed which is the most fragrant and if you chew it  tastes the greenest  and fresh, then you have the seeds in the middle that were inbetween stage and the ones on the left were the seeds most shrivelled dryest and palest. Even the dryest of the cardamon seed will have a fragrance and the pod shell themselves carry quite a bit of fragrance but if you have a choice in your jar always go for the lovely fresher black seeds which will carry the most oil.

Coconut & Cardamon Soup

500g / 1 lb leeks washed and roughly chopped
700g / 1 1/2 lb sweet potato, peeled and roughly chopped
2 large or 3 smaller cardamon pods, crushed and seeds removed (if you want a stronger cardamon taste crush the seeds before putting them in soup)
1 tin 400 ml of coconut milk
500 ml / 1 pint of chicken or vegetable stock, more if needed.
Salt to taste

Put all of the above in a pan cook until the vegetables are tender liquidize and adjust the thickness with more stock to your preferred consistency.

I garnished the soup with chopped chives to carry on with the onion family theme of the leeks.

{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Rebecca 18/01/2010 at 1:46 pm

Yum! This soup sounds so good! Lovely blog, keep up the good work!

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