Creamy Chick Pea Soup

This soup turned out perfect. I had no idea what to do with all those chickpeas (I cooked an entire bag) and I still have enough leftover for another dish, but this soup is really flavourful.

If you make this with tinned chickpeas, cut back on the amount of salt, in fact if you plan to use bouillon for the soup base, it might be worth soaking the tinned chickpeas for a bit to get out a bit of the salt.

So much of what I suggest for spice is approximate-my tastes obviously not mirroring everyone else's. You may prefer to go lighter, or heavier. The only way to really know is to keep tasting and adjusting. What I'm offering here is a sort of template rather than an exact recipe.

You Will Need:

4 cups cooked chick peas/garbanzo beans

2 potatoes, peeled and diced

1 carrot, peeled and diced

2 stalks of celery, stripped and diced

1 large onion, diced

2 large cloves garlic, minced

2 bay leaves

4 cups chicken or vegetable broth

3 tablespoons olive oil

1/8 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 teaspoon thyme

1 teaspoon sage

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

garlic powder (if needed later as a boost)

salt/pepper

4 Tablespoons of melted butter

In a heavy pot, heat the olive oil and add the onion, garlic, celery, potato, and chick peas. Cook over medium heat until onions become transparent and other vegetables begin to soften. Add the spices and stir well. Add the broth and bring everything back to a boil. Reduce to simmer and cook uncovered for about twenty minutes or until vegetables are very soft (potato should fall apart easily.

Strain, reserving liquid. Discard bay leaves. In small batches, puree in a food processor (please, be careful when doing this with hot liquid) adding broth as needed. Return to pot. When all pureed soup is in pot, thin with additional broth until you have a consistency you like (the soup shouldn't be too thick and keep in mind that it will thicken some overnight so you may wish to retain some of the broth for the following day).

At this point, you should taste it again. If the soup seems to lack depth it is most likely a need for additional garlic. A quick dash of garlic powder will probably do the trick. You can also adjust the salt and pepper at this time.

Bring back to a steaming temperature. Add the melted butter as a final enrichment and stir well. Serve hot.