carrot and red pepper soup

I bought 4 pounds of carrots at the market last Saturday, returned home and saw another 4 lbs. sitting in my vegetable drawer.  Carrot soup was definitely on the list of supper meals this week.  When I first tasted this soup warm, I wasn't overly impressed.  I didn't take a picture because I knew it didn't pass my test for making it onto my blog.  The next day for lunch I tried the soup cold.  I immediately dug out a china bowl and got ready for a photo.   This soup is delicate and worked much better as a cold soup versus a hot one.  But you can be the judge.

Carrot and Red Pepper Soup - adapted from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison

Serves 4-6

2 tablespoons butter or olive oil

2 cups diced onion

1 red pepper, cut into1-inch pieces

1 pound carrots, thinly sliced

2 tablespoons white rice

Salt and freshly milled pepper

2 tablespoons chopped parsley

3 tablespoons chopped fresh dill

Grated zest and juice of 1 orange

6 cups water or vegetable stock * (see below)

Finely chopped dill or chopped parsley

Melt the butter in a soup pot and add the onion.  Cook over medium heat until the onions are softened.  Add the pepper, carrots, rice and 1 teaspoon of salt.  Continue cooking for approximately 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Add a grind of pepper, the parsley, dill, orange zest, juice, and water/stock.  Bring to a boil, then simmer, partially covered, until the rice is cooked, about 25 minutes.  Let cool briefly, then puree with an immersion blender or in batches with a blender.  Taste for salt, season with pepper, garnish, and serve.

*  I rarely (never) have fresh vegetable stock handy when I'm making soup.  As I began chopping the vegetables for the soup, I started a quick stock with all the trimmings of my soup ingredients.  I filled a medium sized pot with water and added in the onion peel, red pepper stem/ribs, carrot peel and some extra parsley.  I let this simmer away until I needed to add the stock to the recipe.  I simply drained the stock through a sieve, measured the contents and poured the 6 cups into the soup.  The stock was already boiling, so I didn't need to waste time waiting for the soup to come back up to a boil.  This is a trick that I learned at a cooking class last year.  Apparently many chefs do this.  It didn't take any extra time since I was dumping everything into a pot of water versus the compost bin.  Genius!