NTC 009: it's edible gourd season, mother trucker
Hey friends,
it is your tired friend, Pete Hindle. This week’s edition of the No Talent Club for People That Want to Cook Good (NTCFPTWTCG, or just NTC) is about soup, because I promised a friend I would tell them how to cook pumpkin soup.
The Americans call them pumpkins, the German word for it is Kurbis, and the English call them… squash. In this recipe I will call them Kurbis because squash makes them sound boring, and pumpkin makes me think of Halloween. As an English speaker who lives in Austria, Kurbis is one of those words that has slipped into my vocabulary, partly because nobody knows what I mean when I use the English word. If you don't live in Austria, or speak German, this will help you think of this soup as exotic and exciting.
Kurbis soup gets a bad reputation, because it’s easy and often bland This week I’ve written a recipe for the soup, and then next week I’ll suggest some things that can go on this soup. Or any soup, really.
INGREDIENTS:
Kurbis
Olive oil
Onion Salt
A splash of wine
Water Bouillon or stock (if you have it)
Pepper and other seasonings
Step One: CHOOSE YOUR FIGHTER
There are many different varieties of kurbis. They mostly taste roughly the same, although some people think butternut squash is the most boring. It’s fine to buy a cut-up kurbis in the shop, as there’s nothing worse than having to work out what to do with half an old Kurbis.
Step Two: PREPARE THE FIGHTER
Put the oven onto 200 degrees Celsius, and while it’s warming up, cut up the Kurbis into strips, pour oil over it, and roast it for about half an hour. The secret to making the Kurbis taste nice is that it should be covered in fat and roasted, which is actually the secret to making any vegetable taste good. Potatoes? Cover them in fat and roast them. Kale? Smear fat on it, and then roast it. Tomatoes? Actually a fruit, so they don’t need to be roasted.
Step Three: PREPARE THE ARENA!
It’s time to bring out the onion!
I love onions. My parents never cooked onions, so when I moved into my first shared house, the smell of onions cooking was this heavenly smell that just amazed me. To this day I want to start off every meal by taking some onions out of the cupboard and cooking them slowly until they become delicious, crispy, and caramelised. That’s what you should do now.
Cooking them slowly is the key. You’ve got time, because it takes at least half an hour for the Kurbis to cook, and you only have to stir it a little bit. In fact, this is also a good time to make a cup of tea. Get your big soup pan out of the cupboard and put it on a low heat and dump some oil in there. While the oil is heating up, cut the onions into longer thin pieces, because if you cut the onion too small it will cook too fast and turn into black bits. Tasty black bits, but still - it’s better if some of the onion survives.
Put the onion in the pan with some salt and leave it. Make that tea. Have a sit down. Give the onions a bit of a poke, but if they get too cooked turn the heat off.
Step four: KURBIS KILLER
It’s been half an hour! Stop looking at instagram and start cooking again (I say this because I would probably be looking at instagram). How are those onions doing? If you have a bit of wine, we can use it to free the tasty bits of the onions from the bottom of the pan: this is called deglazing, and it works by using alcohol to thin down the oil, and lift the taste from the cooking pot into the food.
Turn the heat onto medium and pour some wine on top of the pan. I don’t think it matters if this is good wine, but then I don’t drink. Generally you want to use white wine, but red wine or even rose also works. Once you’ve done this - it might make a bit of noise - then take the Kurbis from the oven and dump it in your soup pot. Cover everything with water, and add some bouillon or stock if you have some. Bring the water to the boil and let it simmer until the Kurbis is soft.
Then add salt and pepper to taste. This means, add salt until the soup tastes good. Go nuts. If you add too much salt you can add more water. If you don’t add enough salt you can put some in while you’re eating it.
That’s it. You made soup! I know there isn’t a lot of stages in the end, but honestly: soup is just flavoured water. It’s like tea but using a big chunk of roasted vegetable. The important thing is making roasting the vegetables, or if you can’t do that, making the onions super tasty. You can blend the soup, but try and leave some chunks for you to discover otherwise your food will be a bit boring to eat. Everybody likes chewing.
Serving the soup is about toppings. In this picture of the soup, you can see some yogurt, some pomegranate, some roasted cauliflower, and some other bits.
And then in this soup we have coriander, more pomegranate (I had to use it up) and some sesame seeds. But both soups look better than just a big bowl of brown liquid, which is what most soup turns into. That’s why next week is going to be HOW TO TOP which mostly means soups but could be anything else. See you next week!
FINALLY: how is the layout for you? Do you want more pictures? Give me some feedback and let me know what you want/like/hate. Please be gentle, I have emotions. Hit reply and let me know what's going on - a few people did this last time and it was lovely to hear from you.
Pete
PS: this week's title comes from the classic internet essay, which if you've not read, you should. Even though it's after the season.