Easy Lentil Soup

Being a scrappy rogue mortician is terribly unglamorous. It’s ummm well what’s the opposite of glamorous? Sleepy and rundown? Sure. That’s sounds about right. Good news is that soup is always a fixer upper! Even in the middle of summer I am always down-or up-for a good bowl of healing soup. You’ve probably already guessed that soup is not on my list of “Funeral Food.” I mean maybe you could bring a big old cauldron of soup to a repast and parcel it out but I really don’t recommend that! However, I do recommend bringing a nice bowl of soup to a friend in need, and if you are feeling up to it, you can make a fresh loaf of bread too! Even if you don’t have the energy for bread, your friend will still appreciate the comfort of this lentil soup. Bonus is that it reheats really well which means that they could portion this over several days and feel nourished and loved with every bite.

A couple notes before we get started, one of the most daunting things about cooking is opening up a great recipe and then realizing you don’t have all the ingredients. All of a sudden your “easy one pot soup” becomes a day long excursion to the grocery store, and then getting stuck in traffic and just generally being annoyed. I encourage you to omit or add as you see fit. For example, I rarely have carrots on hand so I just leave them out, the soup is still great despite that. Maybe you don’t have celery seed or fennel seed, try experimenting with whatever you have on hand. Soup is a really great canvas to let your herbs and spices create a fabulous picture so just use this as a base for one example of a soup you can make.

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons coconut oil

• 1 cup diced yellow onion

• 1 cup diced celery

• 3 garlic cloves, minced

• 1 cup diced carrots

• 1 unpeeled white potato cut into 1/2-inch cubes

• 1 cup dried green lentils, sorted and rinsed

• 8 cups veggie stock

• 1 teaspoon fennel seeds

• 1 teaspoon thyme

• 1 teaspoon celery seed

• 1/2 teaspoon dried sage

• 1 bay leaf

• 1 tablespoon soy sauce

• 1 teaspoon white pepper

• salt, to taste

Directions

1. In a large heavy-bottom pot, melt the oil over medium-high heat.

2. Add the onion, celery, and garlic and sauté until the onion is translucent, about 3 minutes.

3. Add carrots, potato, lentils, and stock and bring to a boil.

4. Reduce heat to medium-low, and add fennel seeds, thyme, celery seeds, sage, and bay leaf.

5. Simmer for 30 minutes, or until the lentils become tender.

6. Season the soup with soy sauce and white pepper.

7. Season to taste with salt.