Red Lentil Soup with Spices, Ginger and Garlic

This recipe is a bit famous in our household, a recipe that we have used over the years (since 1997), and laugh about the supposed garlickiness of it. But don’t skimp on the garlic. It is worth every clove. (Actually, because the garlic cooks out, you don’t taste it in the way you might expect.) This is a hearty soup, great for cold cold weather. Roughly chop the ingredients for a rustic farmhouse soup, or chop them finely for a more refined bowl.

Are you looking for similar soups? Try Red Lentil Soup with Feta, Du Puy Lentil Soup, and Turtle Bean Soup.

Browse our collection of Soup Recipes and our Red Lentil recipes. Find some inspiration in our Late Autumn collection of recipes.

Make a large batch so that you can put some in the freezer for those cold nights coming home late without an ounce of energy for cooking.

Prep time: 15 mins
Cooking time: 40 mins
Serves: 4 – 6 people, depending how you use it

ingredients
2 cups split red lentils (masoor dal)
1.75 l vegetable stock or water
2 bay laurel leaves
5 cloves of garlic, peeled and mashed or chopped finely
5 cm piece of ginger, chopped finely
2 carrots, grated
0.5 cups tomatoes, diced
1 red capsicum, diced
0.5 tspn turmeric powder
1 cup onions, sliced
0.5 cups shallots, sliced
1.5 Tbspn olive oil
2 tspn cumin powder
2 tspn coriander powder
0.5 red chilli, finely sliced, or to taste
2 Tblspn lemon juice
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

method
Wash the lentils, removing any impurities, and place in a saucepan with the vegetable stock, bay leaves, garlic and ginger. Bring to the boil, reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the carrots, tomatoes, capsicum and turmeric powder. Simmer for a further 15 minutes.

In a separate pan, sauté the onions and shallots in the olive oil until the onions are soft and just beginning to brown at the edges. Add the remaining spices and sauté for 1 minute more. Remove the bay leaves from the soup and add the sautéed onions mixture and the lemon juice. Season with salt and pepper and pop the lid on the saucepan. Allow to sit for 5 minutes for the flavours to meld, and serve.

This has been cross posted with our sister site, Heat in The Kitchen. It appears there as part of the Retro Recipes series.

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