Roasted Carrot Soup

I went to see my acupuncturist on Monday. I have been visiting him once a month for the last two years. Acupuncture has become part of my maintenance regime, after a doctor at Penny Brohn, suggested that I might find it beneficial in occasionally re-balancing things . I have found that the acupuncture has helped me immensely, even when I thought I was feeling fine. During my appointment, I was talking about giving my juicing machine more work and increase the juice that I was drinking. Why? I thought that my body was in need of the green goodness of more juices. My acupuncturist said, that this might not be the best thing to do. Yes of course juice but it's important to include some warming ingredients such as ginger in the juice, at this time of year. He felt that my constitution was craving warmth and heat at this time of year and that instead of increasing the juice, he recommended I eat more warming soups. Soups are after all more palatable than a cold juice in January.

 Looking at seasonal vegetables available at the moment, there are lots of root vegetables around, which make a starchy filling soup.  Having some organic carrots in the fridge that needed using up and raw carrots were not really appealing on a wet January morning, I decided to make an easy soup instead. I was looking for a new twist in a basic carrot soup recipe so I thought a  roasted carrot soup would be different. I have roasted carrots in some coconut oil before and it brought out their natural sweetness and depth of flavour. So why not a roasted carrot soup I thought?

Here's the healthy bit .....Carrots contain high amounts of Vitamin A, fibre, vitamin K, potassium, manganese, phosphorous, magnesium, vitamin E and zinc. As long as you don't add cream it's non fattening. I have heard that if you have a nasty bout of diarrhoea, carrot soup will help with the recuperation.  Although, I have not put this to the test!

This soup is one to prepare ahead of time too for those days when you don't have much time to cook, but still want something healthy to eat as well as quick. It'll keep about three days in the fridge or you can freeze it as there are no dairy products in the soup.

So here's what I did......

To save time, I included the onion as well. I put the onion wedges and roughly chopped carrot pieces in one layer in a roasting pan and drizzled with coconut oil.  I placed the dish in a 200°C (fan 180°C/390°F/gas 6) preheated oven and roasted for around 30 minutes or until the carrots and onions were starting to brown. I then transferred the vegetables in a large pot with the a pint of  stock and simmered for 10 minutes.  I  put it in my Kitchen Aid blender and as it was quite thick I added more water. But some coconut milk would have been nice. Ready to serve.

This is how it looked in the pan. Nice warming colour.

If you are in the mood for something more elaborate you can "pimp" up your soup with sour cream, yogurt, single or double cream , creme fraiche and serve it with buttered bread.