Lentil Soup – Homemade Soup Recipe

by Sharon Fitzpatrick | Feb 20, 2022 | Main Courses, Soups & Stews

Lentil Soup Recipe:

Lentil soup is a wonderful soup to make.

It is very easy to make and the lentil soup has tremendous flavour.

And lentil soup is extremely good for our health. Lentils have lots of nutritional value.

Cooking with lentils is easy. They don’t need soaking, they just need a rinse.

For this lentil soup I used red lentils but you can use red, brown, green, yellow or black lentils. When choosing your colour lentil for your lentil soup it will alter the colour accordingly.

Either way they are all full of goodness. Lentils are rich in Iron and are an excellent source of protein. Lentils are a great source of fibre too.

I love this lentil soup recipe as it is so delicious, easy to make and it is a very healthy meal, perfect for a lunch or dinner.

You can also freeze this lentil soup too, making it a very practical recipe.

For those living alone it is a perfect way of making a healthy meal once and you can freeze it in individual portions for future uses by just heating it up. With this lentil soup recipe you would probably get about six meals which is great.

And of course those of you with a few in the household, it is perfect too.

I love one pot dinners, less washing up and easy to dish out to your guests or family and you can always just leave the pot on the table and let everyone help themselves.

It is easy and tasty to just heat up your lentil soup the next day (if there is any left of course).

For more great recipes do check out the other blogs.

Please do tell your friends about the website and help spread the love of cooking.

Links for more BLOGS below.

Enjoy browsing through the LifeStyle With Sharon website.

Starters

Main Courses

Desserts

Baking

LifeStyle

Serves:
6 portions

Great For:
Dinner or Lunch

Cooking Time:
30 – 40 mins

Watch on YouTube: Click Here.

Ingredients

300g Or 2 large carrot
160g or 1 large onion
350g or 3 medium potatoes
400g lentils of your choice
20g butter

4 stock cubes
1 ½ litre water
Or you can use homemade stock
Pinch of salt
½ tsp of black or white pepper
2 bay leaves (optional)

Lentil Soup Recipe – Method & Instructions

When you are chopping your vegetable a good tip is to put a tea-towel under your chopping board and this will stop your chopping board moving as you are using your knife to cut. It is safer.

I like to cut and prepare my vegetables and put in some dishes ready for use.

Firstly peel and dice the onion. To prevent your eyes watering cut the onion in half from root end to the other end. Then cut the opposite to the root end off. Keep the root end intact. See the video for a visual explanation.

Secondly peel carrots and chop off one end, keeping one end intact so you have something to hold, so you don’t end up grating your fingers. Then grate the carrot.

Thirdly peel and cut your potatoes. You can out them in water until you are ready to use them. Keeping them in water stops them going black.

Next you need to put your lentils into a sieve and rinse them under the tap.

You can make your stock by placing stock cubes in water.

If you wanted to make your own stock for the lentil soup, you can use water from previously boiled vegetables.

Making your own chicken stock is an a option too, to make a chicken stock then use the bones from a chicken and either boil them in water or put bones and water in a slow cooker and leave overnight. This gives lovely chicken stock. Another way is to boil a chicken in a large pot and use the water as your stock.

Preparation for your Lentil Soup is done – Now let’s make it

Now in a pot melt some butter and add your onion. Mix the onion into the butter, put the lid on and let them sauté for 5 minutes. Keep on a low heat.

After you have cooked your onion for five minutes, add your grated carrot to the pot.

Then add your potatoes to the pot.

Season the lentil soup with salt and pepper.

Add the rinsed lentils, keeping on a low heat and give all the ingredients a good mix.

Pour the stock into the pot and turn up the heat to bring it to the boil. Add in bay leaves.

Once brought to the boil, turn heat down to low again, put the lid on and simmer, stirring occasionally.

Cook for about 20 – 30 minutes.

The lentil soup is meant to be nice and thick but if you feel it is too thick, just add a little water.

Personally I love the soup like this with but if you prefer the go ahead and liquidise it. Some people love it smooth and others love it with bits in, personal preference.

For more lovely soup recipes, see the soup playlist on YouTube.

And for more delicious recipes check out our other blogs.

Enjoy your Lentil Soup.

Happy Cooking

Sharon

LifeStyle With Sharon

Check Out My Blog Categories

Support My Site & Share This Post With Family & Friends

How To Make Vegetable Curry

by Sharon Fitzpatrick | Aug 4, 2021 | Main Courses

How To Make Vegetable Curry:

Vegetable curry is delicious. I love a curry and particularly love a vegetable curry. Most people do. It is a lot easier than you think to make your own curry.

There are a lot of different ways of making a curry and there are so many different types. Today I am showing you one that I make sometimes that people love.

Of course you can add some meat to it but I love having a vegetable curry so I thought I would share it with you.

Having a vegetable curry is a nice alternative to having a meat based dinner. You don’t have to be a vegetarian to enjoy this vegetable curry.

Personally I try to vary my dinner menu throughout the week to include some meat and some vegetarian dishes. Not only is this giving you variety but it is good for us to not be having meat every day.

A vegetable curry can be so easily adapted to suit your personal taste. Any vegetables can be used. With this vegetable curry recipe I have made suggestions but of course you can change it to incorporate your favourites.

For more dinner ideas browse through the main courses blogs and if you fancy a pudding check out the dessert blogs. We also have some great snacks, soup and starter recipe blogs too for you to check out. Enjoy browsing and have fun trying out new recipes.

Serves:
4 – 6 people

Great For:
dinner or lunch

Cooking Time:
30 – 40 mins

Watch on YouTube: Click Here.

Ingredients

2 onions
160g broccoli
160g cauliflower
½ red pepper
80g sugar snap peas
80g green beans
180g carrot
200g peas
200g fresh tomatoes

40g Ghee (or butter)
2 – 3 large heaped tbsp curry paste
1 – 2 tsp tandoori masala curry powder
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
4 tsp coriander
250ml fresh cream
1 can of chick peas
1 tsp brown sugar
¾ cup of rice per person

Vegetable Curry – Method & Instructions

Preparing the vegetables for the Vegetable Curry

With the onion you want to cut in half from route end to the other end then peel it. Cut the onion from end to end into three parts so you have tear shaped onions. Check the video for clarification if you are not sure. Or you can just dice them but I think it is nice with big pieces of onion.

Pull the broccoli apart so you have nice chunky bits.

Cut the cauliflower into sizable chunks.

Chop the red pepper in half, take out the seeds and cut any white bits off. Then cut into either long strips or dice into large pieces.

Trim the edges of the sugar snap peas and leave them whole.

Again trim the ends of the green beans and then cut them in half.

Peel the carrots. Chop off and discard both ends. Cut the carrots into round circles.

If using fresh peas from the garden, then shell the peas and put to one side. Or if using frozen peas just have them ready.

Dice the fresh tomatoes into small pieces.

Steam the vegetables preferably. If you don’t have a steamer them either fry in a wok or boil. Cook the carrots for 5 minutes longer than all the other vegetables. Don’t cook the tomatoes yet. They will be used a bit later for the vegetable curry sauce.

How To Make the Sauce for the Vegetable Curry

You can make the sauce while the vegetables are cooking. Once the vegetables are cooked just leave them to one side ready to add to your vegetable curry sauce.

Melt the Ghee. As an alternative you can just use normal butter or coconut oil or olive oil.

To the melted Ghee add the curry paste. It doesn’t really matter which one. Although Madras curry paste is the one I used for this vegetable curry recipe. Of course you can make your own paste and I will show you how on a future video but it is perfectly fine to use a curry paste from a jar.

Add in the tandoori curry powder or any other curry powder of your choice if you can’t get this particular one.

Stir in the fresh tomatoes.

Pour in a tin of chopped tomatoes.

Let this cook for 10 – 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

One tip I would give is use a deep pot as it can splash.

Then to the sauce add the coriander.

If you wanted to you can liquidise this part of the vegetable curry sauce but I personally don’t.

Turn the heat off as you now pour in the fresh cream. If you didn’t want to use cream then use an extra tin of tomato sauce instead and maybe some yoghurt.

This is now the time to cook your rice as per packets instructions.

Into the vegetable curry sauce add the chickpeas. But first drain the chickpeas and rinse with water.

To the sauce add the brown sugar.

Transfer the vegetable curry sauce into a very large pot and add all your vegetables, stirring all the vegetables into the sauce.

Serve the rice onto a plate and make a well in the middle and dish up your vegetable curry into the well of the rice.

A wonderful accompaniment to this tasty vegetable curry is naan bread. I will show you how to make some naan bread in next week’s YouTube video and Lifestyle With Sharon blog.

Happy cooking and enjoy your homemade vegetable curry.