Cream of Spinach Soup

A creamy soup to lift tempers and temperatures during the last cold weeks of winter.
By Priya Mahadevan

Earlier this month, I was praying that that darned groundhog would not see his shadow – but he did and what’s more, ever since the weather has altered to winter-like conditions with nasty wind-chills. This, after a really balmy spring like January is not cool – I mean for the weather to be so cool.

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This weather has warranted some warming of them cockles – so I made me a cream of spinach soup that got eaten to the last drop.

Agreed, I actually used cream in this recipe, but a cup for about 10 cups of spinach and a small fistful of pine nuts.  The Fat content is hopefully negated by the goodness of the greens. It yielded about 6 servings. A winner soup for those who love spinach.

Cooking & Prep time – 15- 20 Minutes Servings 6

Ingredients

• 1Family Sized Box of Organic Baby Spinach
• 1Small fist ful (about 2 tbsp) pine Nuts
• 1-2 Dry red chilies (cayenne) (not for the faint hearted)
• 1 tsp of whole black peppers (this is a must ;)
• 1 cup of heavy cream
• 1cup of milk (if required)
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 2 tsp olive oil

Preparation

• In a wide mouthed pan, heat the olive oil and temper the chilies, peppers and brown the garlic
• Add the spinach and swiftly toss it around –
• NOTE: A whole box of spinach is a lot volume-wise. So stir in handfuls at a time so as not not get overwhelmed
• Once the leaves have softened a bit, add the cream and the pine nuts and allow them to boil together – this should take 3-5 minutes
• Add some milk if you want more volume
• Salt to liking
• Cool it before you grind.
• Refrigerate if you like cold soups.
• Pour back in the pan and allow it to heat up again, if you like it hot – like we do chez moi.
• This can be served with warm bread or crackers