Nettle, Lemon & Lentil Soup
Around here, “nettle soup” is usually a potato-type soup, but a friend made us a lentil and cumin soup once.
She had used spinach and, while the soup was lovely, the spinach was a bit wilty and didn’t hold up to the brightness of the rest of the soup. Basically, what it needed was nettles.
Now this is a favourite of ours.
Nettles are a great forage this time of year. Picking them while they are young means that they will still be tender and without the stringy stem they develop later in the season. You want to pick just the first 5 or 6 leaves as the older leaves towards the bottom of the plant will be drier.
Nettles really are a miraculous plant. They have so many uses that we devoted an entire chapter to them in Issue 03 of Life in the Making and could still write more. But this soup, is the perfect one for the “4 Seasons in One Day” April weather that we are having.
Nettle, Lemon and Lentil Soup
Ingredients
- 3-4 tbsp sunflower oil
- 1 onion, chopped
- 3 garlic cloves, diced
- 1 tsp ground coriander
- 1 tbsp cumin seeds
- 150g (3/4 cup) dried puy lentils
- 1.2 litres (1.3 quarts) vegetable stock
- 200g (6 cups) cleaned nettles, roughly chopped
- Freshly squeezed juice of 2 lemons
- Salt to taste
Method
- In a large soup pot, add the oil and onions and sautée
- for five minutes over a low heat until softened.
- Add the garlic, coriander, cumin seeds and lentils, then stir for 1-2 minutes until you can smell the spices.
- Add the stock, bring to the boil, then lower the heat and simmer gently for 30 minutes, uncovered, until the lentils are soft.
- Add the nettles and stir until wilted.
- Add the lemon juice to taste and be generous with the salt.
