Happy Birthday Toria!!

Sunday was my best friend's birthday!! While we work across from each other Monday through Friday we don't get to spend enough girlie time together. We had such a great day Saturday at her house eating this soup, chocolate mousse, drinking tea, and picking out her birthday outfit for drinks.

I found this recipe on Martha Stewart's website. She had a whole slideshow of winter soups and I think I printed off every other one! I thought this was a fantastic soup. My husband looked at it and said, "I don't eat cooked carrots." I gave him and a look and he tried it and admitted that the soup was very good! I didn't feel like transferring the soup from my dutch oven to the blender so I just used the immersion blender which worked fine. The recipe says it feeds 4 but I halved it and it fed both of us and her boyfriend with some left over! I served this with homemade croutons.

Curried Carrot Soup

Source: Martha Stewart

Serves 4

2 tablespoons butter
1 cup chopped onion
1 teaspoon curry powder
Coarse salt and ground pepper
2 cans (14 1/2 ounces each) reduced-sodium chicken broth (about 3 1/2 cups)
2 pounds carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
1 to 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh cilantro, for garnish (optional)

Heat butter in a Dutch oven or large (4- to 5-quart) saucepan over medium heat. Add onion, curry powder, 2 teaspoons salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is soft, about 5 minutes.

Add broth, carrots, and 3 cups water; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover, and simmer until carrots are tender, about 20 minutes.

In a blender, puree soup in batches until smooth; transfer to a clean saucepan. Add more water to thin to desired consistency. Reheat, if necessary. Stir in lemon juice. Serve garnished with cilantro, if desired.