Adapted from a recipe in Yotam Ottolenghi’s Simple, this light and fresh soup that can be served chilled or warm (although it’s best served chilled). It’s a wonderful starter to enjoy as part of a main meal, as it is made up of non-starchy veggies. Including a bulky but low calorie veggie soup before a meal can help you to meat your veg requirements for the day, and can greatly aid with satiety (thus preventing overeating).
This soup only provides 44 kcal, not even nearly sufficient to be a meal on its own but perfect as a low calorie starter. If you want to serve this soup as a light meal, add some unrefined carbs (e.g. wholegrain bread or a fruit), a protein (e.g. cheese, hummus, or egg), and a healthy fat (e.g. avo, olive oil, or nuts).
Cauliflower, cucumber, ginger soup
Ingredients
- 1 small cauliflower head broken into florets
- 2 sprigs fresh mint
- 4 cm fresh ginger thinly sliced
- 1 cucumber peeled and roughly chopped
- 1 clove garlic
- 1/2 tsp each salt + black pepper
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- 1 cm fresh ginger in addition to the above-mentioned ginger
- 1/2 cup plain yoghurt
- Garnish with any of: sesame oil, olive oil, toasted flaked almonds, plain yoghurt, herbs etc. optional
Instructions
- Bring a pot of salted water to the boil with the ginger slices and the mint, then add the cauliflower and blanch for 2 1/2 minutes, until barely cooked and still tender. Drain, discarding the mint and ginger.
- Divide half the cauliflower into the serving bowls, then put the other half with all the other ingredients into a high speed blender and blend until smooth and creamy. Taste and adjust salt/pepper.
- To serve chilled, refrigerate the soup for at least one hour before pouring over the cauliflower into bowls. If you want to serve it warm, transfer back to a saucepan after blending, bring to the boil, end then spoon over the cauliflower in the serving bowls.
- Garnish the soup with any of the options, or serve as is. Enjoy!
Stunning starter soup 🙂