His & Hers Q8

Since Ramadan started I wanted to make a pumpkin soup, I never had one and I thought it would taste delicious because I like pumpkins :love:. However I had no recipe. So when Diet Care’s cook book arrived at my door, guess what was the first soup in the book was? yup it was pumpkin!

I made the soup but changed a bit in the ingredients …

Here is Diet Care’s recipe:

- 6 cups boiled pumpkin cut into cubes.

- 1 cup boiled potato cut into cubes.

- 1/2 cup boiled sweet potato cut into cubes.

- 4 tbsp fine chopped onions .

- 4 tbsp fine chopped spring onions.

- 4 tbsp fine chopped celery.

- 1 tbsp dried oregano.

- 2 tbsp white flour.

- 1 1/2 tbsp sugar.

- 2 pinch onion powder

- 2 pinch garlic powder.

- 1 1/2 organic vegetable powder or vegetable stock .

- 2 dashes low sodium  salt.

- 1 pinch white pepper powder.

- 3 cups water.

Preparation:

- Melt 1/4 tbs butter in a pan, saut’e onion, celery until golden and crisp.

- Add boiled pumpkin, potato, vegetable broth, oregano and cook on low heat for ten minutes.

- In a separate pan, make roux by melting remaining butter then add the flour and mix with a hand wire  whisk  then add 1/4 cup of water and mix until no dump remains, then ad to the previous mixture.

- Simmer for 10 minutes more. Remove from fire. Blend half quantity in blender and pass it through fine sieve and leave the other half  to contain pumpkin pieces . Mix both togeather.

- Add whipping cream, mix well and cook for 5 more minutes .

- On serving garnish with Parmesan and serve hot.

My way:

I followed the same recipe but instead of sweet potato I used carrots and skipped the cream and celery . yumm!

Great nutritional benefits of pumpkins that you should know:

* Very low in calories which is why they are recommended on dieting programs.

* Its a rich source of fiber, anti-oxidants vitamins and minerals .

* It contains Zea-xanthin which has an ultra-violet  rays filtering action which helps to protect against age related macular  disease.

* Great source of antioxidants such as vitamin A, E and C.

* It’s rich in carotenoids which increase the immune system’s health.

So they keep you young! healthy! and skinny!