Creamy spinach and mushroom soup with vegan creme fraiche
Easy, super-creamy, you won't believe it's dairy-free.
Ingredients
Spinach-mushroom soup
- 1 leeks
- 1 onions white, yellow, brown
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1 tbsp olive oil (extra virgin)
- 16 ounces mushrooms cremini, chopped
- 1/4 cup wine (marsala or madeira)
- 3 cups vegetable stock (low-sodium)
- 1 cup coconut milk regular or light
- 1 cup lentils red
- 1-1/2 tbsp Bragg's liquid aminos (or tamari)
- 1 bay leaves
- 1/2 tsp sea salt
- 1 pinch black pepper
- 1 pinch savory (dried)
- 1 pinch thyme (dried)
- 1 pinch fennel (dried)
- 1 pinch basil (dried)
- 6 handfuls spinach fresh, 1 handful per serving
Vegan creme fraiche
- 1/2 cup cashews raw (60 g)
- 1 lemons
- 1 tsp sea salt
Instructions
Spinach-mushroom soup
- To clean the leek: Cut off the green top and compost it. Slice the leek in half lengthwise, leaving the root end intact. Hold the leek upside-down under the tap, and wash all the dirt from in between the layers. If it's a very dirty leek, you might have to cut off the root end and separate all the pieces. Roughly chop the leek.
- Peel the onion, cut in half, and roughly chop.
- Smash the garlic cloves under the flat side of a large chef's knife, remove the papery skin, and roughly chop.
- Clean the mushrooms using a damp paper towel or damp kitchen towel. Thinly slice about a quarter of them (4 oz./115 g) and set aside. Roughly chop the rest.
- Heat the oil in a large heavy saute pan over medium heat and add the leek and onions. Cook for about five minutes until tender, then add the garlic and cook for another minute. You want it to be golden brown, not starting to burn.
- Add the chopped mushrooms and cook for about 10 minutes, until they have released their moisture. Add the wine to deglaze the pan, cooking and stirring occasionally until the wine is absorbed.
- Add the vegetable broth, coconut milk, lentils, Bragg's, bay leaf, sea salt, and herbs and simmer for 30 minutes until the lentils are tender.
- [Make the vegan creme fraiche at this point, so you can use what's left in the blender to add creaminess to the soup.]
- Remove the bay leaf and pour the soup into a blender, using a spatula to get the pan clean. Blend until very smooth.
- Add a small amount of wine or oil to the pan and cook the reserved sliced mushrooms until golden. If you wish, set aside a few of these to garnish the top of each serving.
Vegan creme fraiche
- Soak the cashews for one hour. Drain.
- Drain the soaked cashews and put them into your blender with the juice from the lemon and the salt. Blend, stopping to scrape down the sides as needed. (Use the tamper if you have a Vitamix.) The mixture should end up a very smooth sour cream consistency. If you need to, add a little bit of filtered water to get it to blend. Blend until it is velvety smooth.
- Scrape out the cashew mixture into a storage bowl. DO NOT WASH THE BLENDER, use it to blend the soup.
- Store the vegan creme fraiche refrigerated for up to 3 days.
Notes
Per serving:
- 276 calories
- 10 g fat
- 3 g saturated fat
- 4 g monounsaturated fat
- 1 g polyunsaturated fat
- 0 g trans fat
- 0 g cholesterol
- 1212 mg sodium (275 mg sodium with salt omitted, using low-sodium vegetable broth. Omit the Bragg's/tamari to make this low-sodium)
- 612 mg potassium
- 33 g carbohydrate
- 7 g fiber
- 4 g sugars
- 16 g protein
- 7 Weight Watchers Points Plus