Garlic-Rosemary Cauliflower Potato Soup with Smoky-Maple Skillet Chickpeas
This super flavorful and simple soup contains potato, cauliflower, garlic and plenty of smoky-sweet skillet chickpeas on top. Accents of rosemary and pepper.
Servings: 4 servings
Ingredients
Soup:
- 1 head of cauliflower, organic (medium sized)
- 1 medium Russet potato, diced (skin on)
- 3-5 cloves garlic
- 1 ½ tablespoon vegan butter (Earth Balance or similar)
- 4 cups vegetable broth
- 2-3 tablespoon nutritional yeast
- 1 bay leaf
- fresh rosemary
- salt and black pepper to taste
Chickpeas:
- 1 ½ cups chickpeas, drained/rinsed
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- 2 teaspoon maple syrup
- smoked paprika to taste
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1-3 teaspoon nutritional yeast
Instructions
- Bring a large pot of water to boil. Add the potatoes. Cook for 5 minutes, then add in the cauliflower. Cover with lid and cook until both potatoes and cauliflower are tender, about 3-5 minutes longer.
- While the veggies are cooking, you can do the chickpeas in a flash. Heat a skillet over high heat. Add the olive oil. When oil is hot, add the chickpeas. Shake pan a bit to coat chickpeas in oil. Turn heat to medium, cover with lid, allow to cook 2-3 minutes. Uncover lid and turn heat to low (so you do not burn the spices) add in the spices to taste, as well as the nutritional yeast. Shake pan to distribute spices. Finally add the maple syrup and shake pan - the pan will still be warm enough to caramelize the syrup a bit. For a more intense 'candied' texture you can turn the heat back up to high for just a minute. Note: If you are worried about burning the spices doing this, add the spices last. When chickpeas are done, turn off heat and set pan aside. Allow the chickpeas to sit and rest while you finish the soup. As chickpeas cool the coating will candy even more into sticky-sweet-spicy bliss. Add salt to taste if desired.
- Drain the water from the veggie pot and add the boiled potato and cauliflower to a blender. Add the garlic, veggie broth, vegan butter and nutritional yeast. Blend from low to high until smooth - careful while blending because contents will be very hot.
- Pour the blended soup into the large (now empty) soup pot. Add the bay leaf and one sprig rosemary. you can add a few finely chopped bits of rosemary for more intense flavor. Bring to a boil then reduce heat to low and simmer uncovered for five minutes. This helps to thicken the soup a bit. Taste the soup and add salt and pepper to taste.
- Serve soup with a generous spoonful of the skillet chickpeas over top.