Carrot and fennel soup with infused sesame oil and young sunflower seeds. It’s the second half of summer but carrots are still in their prime, so it would be a shame to not make this creamy and nutritious soup. With a slice of sourdough bread, it can even pass as a light lunch.
Alongside the carrots, I found a couple of self-seeded fennels growing in the garden. They kind of missed the proper seeding time since they just grew in height disregarding the fact they need to form a nice crunchy base. But nevertheless, they smell and taste amazing. So I used them to infuse the soup. It worked wonderfully.
the carrots …
With all the rain this summer, the carrots in our garden are flourishing. We have carrots in the garden every summer, but I don’t remember when they were so many and this good. I guess every seed sprouted. They are crispy, sweet, and simply gorgeous.
Given a good airy and sandy soil, you should be able to grow carrots. They are quite delicate in their early growth stage when it is essential to clean the weeds around them. This can be a tiresome and quite delicate process since the seedlings are so tiny it is hard not to pull them along with the weeds. But once they start to get stronger they are much easier to handle and don’t require too much effort. With enough water and a good breeze to keep the little bugs away, you should have some carrots in around 3 months.
I am just reading the book The Fate of Food by Amanda Little in which she describes how many organic producers chucked away many carrots from the packaging production line because they were not perfect in structure, i.e. they had a curve or two instead of being perfectly elongated. I find this deeply saddening. The poor carrot is just adjusting to its environment i.e. the soil, which might be too hard to push through so it grows around it. I just don’t understand what makes it “bad”? We as people adapt and adjust to our environments all the time and we are praised for it, but we can’t adapt to have a curvy carrot on a plate. Let’s hope this will change.
the sunflowers …
This year we also planted some sunflowers. Sunflowers are such a beautiful addition to the garden. Every time I enter the garden it’s as if they are saying hello with their little heads, always smiling, tilted towards me.
The latest storm broke off a couple of flowers, as they were just too heavy to withstand the winds and the hail, which, sadly, happens more often each year.
The sunflowers were not fully ripe yet, but I hate throwing away food so we cleaned some for snacking and some went directly into this soup as a garnish. They have a fresh zingy taste, something similar to an unripe hazelnut.
how to …
It is very straight forward to make this creamy carrot fennel soup with infused sesame oil. There is not much to it apart from prepping the veggies, carrots and fennel, and cooking it.
A little more care should be given to the sesame oil and making sure it does not burn, but that’s about it.
Hope you enjoy it!
Creamy carrot fennel soup with infused sesame oil
Equipment & Tools
- Blender or hand blender
INGREDIENTS
- 1 kg carrots
- 100 g fennel (one extra small)
- 3 tbsp olive oil (extra virgin)
- 1 tbsp light muscovado sugar
- 1.4 L chicken or vegetable stock
- 2 tbsp toasted sesame oil
- 1 tsp crushed Nora pepper
- 1½ tbsp sunflower seeds
- salt & pepper (freshly grounded)
INSTRUCTIONS
The soup
- Clean the carrots with the vegetable brush.
- Cut the carrots lengthwise in half and then across so that each piece is around 1 cm thick. Set aside.
- Wash the fennel and cut in similar size pieces as the carrots. Set aside.
- Warm the cooking pot on medium heat. Once warm add the olive oil. To the pot add the fennel and carrots. Cook for a couple of minutes to get the natural sugars going.
- Add light muscovado sugar and cook for another half minute.
- Add chicken or vegetable stock and cook on medium heat, low simmering point.
- Season with salt to your preference.
- Cook for 15 minutes or until the fennel and the carrots are tender.
- Take from the heat, add the soup to the blender and mix until nice and creamy. Do this step in two batches if the whole soup doesn't fit in the blender.
- Once creamed, transfer back to the pot and leave on low heat to retain the temperature but not to simmer anymore.
- If the soup is too thick at this point you can add more stock or water. Adjust to your liking.
- In a small pan add the sesame oil and pepper flakes. Turn the heat on low to medium to infuse the oil with the pepper. Stir constantly. It should take around 3-5 minutes. Make sure the heat is not too strong as we don't want the oil to burn.
- Taste the soup and adjust the salt if needed.
- Plate the soup. Drizzle the sesame infused oil and sprinkle with sunflower seeds. Add some green tips from the fennel.
NOTES
- I never peel the carrots but rather just clean them from dirt with the vegetable brush since I always use the carrots from my garden and they are not treated with anything. If you do peel them you will end up with a bit less weight of carrots in the recipe. Make sure to account for that.
- Instead of the blender, you can use a hand blender. Either way, it should work. I just find that the blender produces more uniform results in less time.
- Try to get organic carrots and fennel as they will have more flavor.
- If you can find some wild fennel that would be great as well. In this case, chop into small pieces just the softer parts and the more woody ones leave in larger chunks and fish the large ones out before blending. Their flavor released during cooking will be enough to infuse the soup.
- If you make the soup too watery note that the sunflower seeds will sink in the soup.
