Lemony Hummus Soup for the Big Baby

There is a cold bug going around and I plan to keep it at bay. My husband "J" came home early today from work saying that he wasn't feeling well.

Well, that solves the dilemma of what to make for dinner. Soup!!

The next question was what kind of soup? Well, it MUST have garlic in it. And also a good source of Vitamin C in the the form of lemon juice. And a of course a protein source like chickpeas. Perhaps a vegetable or two of some kind...onions, peppers. That's it folks! Aside from the veggie stock and the seasonings, this is the makings of a thick and creamy, lemony chickpea soup. Once you puree it, of course.

I don't know about you, but I like to have some crusty bread with my soup. I had part of a stale baguette on the kitchen counter, that I thought I would slice into little crostinis with which to scoop up the soup. I grabbed a serrated knife to slice through the very hard bread and ended up slicing my finger in the process. Ouch! I dropped what I was doing to see the wound. Once I inspected the cut and saw that it wasn't too serious, I wrapped up the finger and went back to slicing the hard bread.


At the dinner table, I dove into the soup hungrily. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the soup was good. Really good! Tasty with a pronounced lemony twang and a thick and creamy consistency and...well, really good! J agreed with me too. He quickly devoured the soup between sniffles. We decided to re-name the soup, "hummus soup" (original name being Chickpea Lemon Soup) because it was almost like eating a bowl of piping, hot hummus. In the process of talking about this soup, I had almost forgotten about my throbbing, sore finger.

And what about the bread, you ask? Well, I dunked the stale bread into the soup and allowed the steam and the heat from the soup to soften it up. Yum! I was quite content.

How could such a simple sounding soup, taste so good? I only used a short list of everyday common ingredients. Nothing fancy. And it was fast to make also. Aside from the sliced finger, I would say making this soup was a painless experience.

This is the perfect meal for a cold day, a impending cold, a finger boo-boo and a big baby. Who's the big baby? I'll let you figure that one out for yourself :)

Lemony Hummus Soup (taken from David and Rachelle Bronfman's cookbook "CalciYum!")

3 cups cooked chickpeas or 2 cans, rinsed and drained
3 cups vegetable stock
1 red bell pepper, chopped
3 small onions, chopped (I used 1 large onion)
4 large cloves garlic, minced
1 bay leaf (I used 2 leaves)
3 tbs lemon juice (I added more lemon juice at the end)
2 tbs chopped parsley (I omitted the parsley)
2 tsp olive oil
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp black pepper

1. In a large pot with a lid, combine all ingredients, cover and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

2. Remove bay leaf. In batches, with a blender or food processor, puree soup until smooth (or semi-smooth in my case), returning pureed soup to pot. Heat for another 5 minutes and serve.