Crushed Lentil Soup

I wanted to make Michael one of his favorite dishes because he's been working so hard. I've never made crushed lentil soup before but I think it turned out quite delightful!

Ingredients:

3/4 onion, chopped

1 green bell pepper, chopped

6 c. vegetable stock

1 c. dry lentils (I used brown but I think yellow would be good as well!)

1/3 c. uncooked rice (I used long grain)

1 tbsp. cumin

1 tsp. thyme

2 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. black pepper

lemon juice

Instructions:

- Sauté onions and bell pepper in a fairly large saucepan. Since I was using my saucepan to dissolve my vegan bullion cubes, I just did this in a skillet with a bit of oil. Cook these over medium heat until they're just softened up -- about 10 minutes.

- When the veggies seem about right, add those along with the remaining ingredients except lemon juice into your saucepan. Bring this to a boil.

- Cover and cook on medium heat for at least 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. I think I cooked mine for an hour.

- Once done cooking, transfer soup to a food processor and puree. Don't puree it too much -- I made sure to leave some of the lentils whole.

- Return pureed soup to saucepan to reheat. If the soup seems a bit too thick, feel free to add some water to make it the consistency you prefer. I think I added almost a cup of water.

- Stir in lemon juice and serve!

Michael and I had a bit of a feast last night! I made some small pita for the soup (pictured below) and still had a few big ones leftover for falafel sandwiches. Don't worry, we did not eat all that pita last night. We ended up eating the soup, baked falafel patties on homemade pita bread with green peppers, hummus, and some garlic spread that I made. Everything was amazing. It seems like a lot of food but we ended up having quite a bit of leftovers, which is good for me! The soup turned out better than I thought it would. We both loved it and I will most definitely be making that again.

Here are the small pita I made using the recipe in the last post. This made A LOT... definitely more than what would generally come in a bag of small pita bread. This picture only shows what I could fit on a plate! They're nice, too, because they split open very easily. They are definitely good for small pocket sandwiches or for dipping in crushed lentil soup :)