Curried Chickpea & Kale Soup

I’ve made three holiday cookies/dessert recipes over the last week, I’ll be making two more for our annual department cookie swap tomorrow, and I’ll be coming home from the cookie swap with an entire container full of about a million more cookies… I’m certainly not complaining, but around this time of year I always try to make sure I make my meals as healthy and nourishing as possible to help balance out the excessive cookie consumption a little!

When I saw this pretty green soup in Clean Eating magazine, I knew it was just what I needed, plus it featured a flavour combination – curry powder, kale, chickpeas, and coconut milk – that I hadn’t seen before in a soup!  And it used beans as a thickener, which I liked so much from the roasted tomato & white bean soup I tried last week.

The flavours in this soup all work together and make a thick and filling soup that you can feel good about eating!  You could probably fit a lot more kale in there too if you want to feel even better about it! The original recipe had a quick, 15 minute preparation, but I decided to sauté some onions, garlic, and ginger first to add some flavour.  This made my version slightly longer to prepare, but it’s still really easy to make on a weeknight, leaving you plenty of time left in the evening to bake some cookies :)

Curried Chickpea & Kale Soup

Adapted from Clean Eating Magazine, Quick & Easy Meals Special Issue

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 teaspoon olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
1 tablespoon curry powder
1 teaspoon cumin
2 cups vegetable stock
2 cups low fat coconut milk (canned)
2 cans (15-19 fl oz each) chickpeas, rinsed and drained
2 cups packed torn kale leaves
1 teaspoon honey or agave
Salt & Pepper

Directions:

Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add onion and sauté until soft and translucent, about 4-5 minutes. Add garlic and ginger and sauté for another 30 seconds to 1 minute, stirring occasionally. Add curry powder and cumin and stir together for about 30 seconds, until fragrant. Add vegetable stock, coconut milk, chickpeas, and kale, and let simmer for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Transfer soup to a blender in two batches, remove the plastic stopper from the top of the blender and cover with a paper towel to allow steam to escape. Puree until smooth, then return to saucepan. Add honey and season with salt and pepper to taste, reheating the soup for a couple of minutes. If the soup is too thick, add more vegetable stock or water to thin it out to desired consistency.

Serve warm with naan bread.