Yogurt, White Bean and Garlic Soup
If you ever wished to have garlic bread in the form of a soup, this is it. If you never thought you wanted it, you should now. It’s creamy, it’s garlicky, it’s good.
This recipe was inspired by Ottolenghi’s Hot Yogurt and Fava Bean Soup in Plenty. That recipe is delicious. If you’re someone who likes to search out ingredients, you should give it a go.
While this soup has protein, it is a light soup so treat it as side.
Ingredients
2 Tbl olive oil
1 medium onion
4 celery stalks
1 large carrot
water
1 tsp dried thyme
1/2 c (packed) fresh parsley leaves and small stems
5 bay leaves
1.5 quarts water
30 ounces of canned white beans (keep the brine)
1/3 c brown rice
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 c Greek yogurt
2 tsp garlic powder
1 egg
salt (maybe)
ground sumac
baby arugula
Directions
Heat olive oil in a 1 gallon (4 quart) sauce pan on medium heat.
Slice off the ends of the onion, and quarter it. Remove the peel but keep it. Put the onion and the peel in the pot.
Take the celery and cut the stalks into four pieces (leave the leaves on) and put it in the pot.
Cut the carrot into 1 inch pieces and put in the pot.
When the vegetables are soft and the onions begin to brown (not too much, you want to build some flavor, but don’t want to darken your soup too much), add water to cover the vegetables.
Add the thyme, bay leaves, and parsley. Bring the pot to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer for 1 hour.
Remove the vegetables and herbs with a slotted spoon and discard. Some of the thyme will still be in the pot — just go with it.
Add the rice and cook until the rice is soft (about 40 minutes). If you have quick rice, just cook it until the rice is done. Add the beans (including the brine) and pepper.
Turn off the heat and puree the soup. Immersion blender is the easiest, but a regular blender will give you a smoother soup.
Mix the yogurt and and egg together in a medium bowl. Add a ladle of soup into the yogurt mixture and stir. Repeat until half of your soup is in the bowl. Pour the yogurt mixture back into the pot.
Add the garlic powder and enough water to have 2.5 quarts of soup. Taste. Add salt if needed. Since we added the bean brine, you might not need additional salt. It will depend on the brand of beans you used.
Heat the soup to desired consistency — don’t boil it.
Add the soup to the bowl and garnish with sumac and baby arugula.
Notes
If you don’t have sumac, don’t go and buy it. You can skip it or add paprika or red chile for color.
Please oh please oh please use arugula. If you need to substitute it, use dandelion leaves or radicchio. Spinach is too mild of a green in this dish.
The garlic flavor mellows as the soup sits.
Soup will separate in the fridge so just stir it when you reheat.
You can freeze individual servings of the soup to use as an easy side dish.
