Roasted Carrot Ginger Soup

With the arrival of the first cool weekend of the season, it was fiiiinally time to make our {absolute} favorite soup! I have made several alterations to make this soup a bit healthier..now it the Ultimate Fall Meal! I know it is hard to believe, but this baby is so filling you won't need to make anything else except a loaf of yummy bread to dip!

** Before I give you the recipe, I want to quickly mention something...before I made this soup, I had never used fresh ginger before. I went to the store, didn't know where to look, what it looked like or how to select a piece. Since I'm sure there are others out there in a similar position, I just wanted to address the "ginger issue" so everyone can enjoy this one! **

Meet, Ginger Root:

 I got this baby at Shoprite, near the other root veggies, many of which you will use in this recipe. I usually look for the tiniest piece I can find, approximately 1.5-2 inches long. To use it, you have to first wash it, then using a veggie peeler, remove all the "skin" to reveal a yellowish color. Chop off all the knobbies (technical term) and you're good to go. (If you are intimidated by this particular piece of produce or can't find a good piece at the store, go for the ground ginger, it works too!)


Ok, moving on...

Roasted Carrot Ginger Soup

Here's what you need to start:

1.5 lb carrots

1 lb parsnip

1 lg onion,

6 Tbsp butter, I used light butter

3 Tbsp dark brown sugar

1.5 inches ginger root

8 cups chicken (or veggie for a vegetarian soup) broth

sour cream 

chives for garnish

(The broth is not pictured here because my super hubs was at the store for the second time that day picking it up for his scatter-brained wife. I'm losing it.  And I'm pretty sure I'm too young for that, so I'm not sure what to think...hehe) Anyway...


So here's what you need to do:


1) Pre-heat your oven to 350. 
2) Chop the carrots and parsnips into quarters, slice the onion, and mince the ginger root. Layer all of these in a roasting pan. Dot veggies with pads of butter then sprinkle with brown sugar.

 3) Pour in 2 cups of chicken broth and cover with foil.

4) Bake for 2 hours. 

At this point in the recipe, the authors tell you that while the veggies are cooking, you can spend time helping your children with their homework. How sweet of them! Well, since it was Saturday and I do not have children, I spent my two hours doing laundry and watching King of Queens with SP. How will you spend your two hours??

5) Remove veggies from oven and {carefully} transfer them to a large sauce pan or soup pot. Add the remaining chicken broth and bring mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes. 

If not, no worries- use a regular blender and puree in batches. Oh, and this is where I stopped taking pictures because I totally forgot. Sorry!**

6)  In batches, puree soup, pouring it into a new bowl. When everything is a beautiful, even orange, return it to the pot and heat through. Garnish with sour cream and chives if desired.

Serve hot with lots of tasty bread, OR in an awesome bread bowl. 

Try it, it's really, really yummy and fairly healthy too!

Let me know if you like it, I'd love to hear from you! 

:-)