Soup sounds boring at first. But I am pretty sure everyone has a soup  they remember fondly. Because soup in general is boring – but a good soup is memorable! To me there is 3 aspects to soup: taste (obviously), color and texture. The right balance of taste especially when it comes to salt is critical! But when we look at colors and consider texture everyone might have a different perspective.  I like a white or orange soup… green soup or smoothie turn me off! So I favor carrots, pumpkin and butternut squash! As for the texture I like a nice velvety  texture vs chunky.

So what is the secret to texture? To get a velvety texture you need something to tie the ingredients. Potatoes are a good starchy option another is a legume like lentils. This recipe explores using lentils for the perfect texture! Since I love both butternut squash and carrots I used both in this recipe.

Ingredients:

• Carrots (4 large carrots – 1 1/2 cup))
• Butternut squash (2 cups)
• 1 Shallot
• 1/3 cup red lentils
• 1 leak
• 1tbs butter
• Chicken stoke
• Salt/Pepper/Paprika
• Berber Spice (optional)

Step 1:

Prepare all the ingredients. Pill and roughly slice the shallots and carrots. Cut the dark green leaves from the Leak Slice the leak in half and clean it. Then chop the leak in 1/2 inch pieces. Peel and dice the butternut.

Step 2:

In a pressure cooker, put the butter over medium/low heat. Mix in the Shallots until transparent, add a little salt pepper, paprika and 1/2 tsp Berber spice ( it will give a little bit of a kick to your soup – abstain if you don’t like spice). Add the carrots mix for 2-3mn, add the leak mix well and cook another 2 minutes. Add the lentils, make sure to stir well. Finally add the butternut squash and a little more salt. Cover with chicken stock, all vegetables should covered not drowned. You can always add chicken stock if it it too thick at the end.

Step 3:

Cook in pressure cooker for about 40mn. Once cooked you will want to blend the soup with hand held blender or food processor.