This is a nice soup with great color, flavor, and tex­ture. It would prob­ably work both hot or cold, but I enjoy this hot. The soup is simple and can be made vegan. I enjoy this with some goat cheese and fresh baguette.

Ingre­di­ents

• 1 Tbsp. coconut oil
• two cloves garlic, minced
• two shal­lots, finely chopped
• two red bell pep­pers, roasted to black, skinned, seeded, and chopped
• 1 to 1.5 tsp. red curry paste
• 1 15oz. can chicken broth or veg­etable broth
• 1 c. water
• 1 c. coconut milk or 1/2 cup each coconut milk and heavy cream
• salt and black pepper to season

Other tools

• A baking sheet
• A blender
• A medium size pot

Roasting red pep­pers is pretty simple. Heat your oven to about 500 degrees F. Open the top of the pep­pers, pull out the stem and heart of seeds. Place some alu­minum foil on a baking sheet and place your pep­pers on the foil. Make sure they are dry. Roast the pep­pers in the oven until the exte­rior is black, around 10 min­utes. After you take out the pep­pers, wrap the foil around them, sealing them inside. Take them off the baking sheet and let them cool. Once cooled down a bit, you should be able to easily remove the black­ened skin. You can chill the pep­pers in the fridge to make it go faster. Try to save any liquid from the pep­pers; mix it with your broth. After skin­ning the pep­pers, chop them up. Now you’re ready.

1. In a medium pot, saute your garlic and shal­lots in the oil for a few min­utes. The shal­lots should become translu­cent and start to take on color.
2. Add the red curry paste. Stir the paste into the shal­lots, con­tin­uing to saute until you can smell the aroma of the paste.
3. Add the roasted red pepper, broth and water. Bring to a boil and then simmer for 10 minutes.
4. Take the soup off the heat and let it cool a bit.
5. Set up your blender. Once the soup has cooled a bit, puree your soup until smooth.

If you have a large blender, you may be able to puree all the soup at once. If you have a small blender, puree the soup in batches. A good rule is to never fill your blender more than half way with hot liquid. Also, it’s best if your blender has a vent in the lid. You do not want to blend the hot liquid in a sealed blender. It will explode.

1. Transfer the soup back into the pot. Mix in the coconut milk/heavy cream. Season with salt and pepper. When the soup is warmed, it’s ready to eat.

The soup can be dressed with some fresh herb or a bit of goat cheese.