Partial transcript from episode: Creamy, Decadent Vegan Soup Secrets
Now, some folks really like to thicken their soups with noodles. And of course, depending on the type of noodle you choose, you can achieve your desired thickness and hardiness really easily. Now myself, I like to use noodles more for broth soups, like, you know, vegetable soup or my version of chicken noodle, which is made with seasoned and sauteed tempeh, carrots, celery, potato, you know, the works for chicken noodle soup, but I use tempeh instead as my substitute for the chicken. And by the way, it is awesome. I'll have to post that one on the recipe blog as well. But the best secret of all that I've discovered in transforming my cream soups and chowder recipes to dairy -free is that adding a can of Northern white beans to your soup recipe along with a few pulses from an immersion blender will create the most creamy, decadent, and nutritious dairy-free soup you've ever tasted.
Remember that legumes are one of the most nutrient-dense foods that we can eat. And I don't know about you, but I'd sure rather make my soup thick and creamy with something that adds some essential nutrients to my diet than just using, you know, plain old bread or rice. Those are good. But when you've got this option available to you, why not choose the nutrient-dense version?
So what I do, for example, with my potato and corn chowder, which is on our food blog, by the way, at ValleyGreenVegan, I'll leave a link down below, you can add a can of either cannellini or great Northern white beans along with all the other ingredients, you know, potatoes, corn, carrots, veggie stock, onions, and seasonings. I let it simmer for around about half an hour. And then I take my little immersion blender. And if you don't have one of these, it's well worth a purchase off Amazon. Some people call it a stick blender and it comes in so handy for so many things. I'll leave a link in the show description below to the one on Amazon that I bought and you can check that out.
So I take my little stick blender and I just pulse it in the hot soup four or five times, just enough to mush up the beans. You don't want to over blend it because you really still want plenty of chunky potatoes and carrots, you know, carrot slices left in your chowder. But this by far, this small step, is the best, excuse me, best method I've found for giving your soup creamy thickness and also providing some darn good nutritional value. The same method can be used with cannellini beans when you're making like vegan cream sauces. But I will save that one for another podcast episode because that's a whole nother subject where I get into soaking cashews and things like that too when I make my, you know, mac and cheese. It's so good.
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