Nutty Sweet Potato Soup

Since I get my love of cooking from my mom and we love to cook together, I have been trying to get her to be a guest blogger on here. She is always cooking up new recipes and then giving me her review of them. Tonight she emailed me some pictures and a recipe for a sweet potato soup. It looks delicious and I 100% trust her taste. So I'm posting her review of the recipe and her pictures. I have no doubt it's every bit as good as she says. Plus, this will be a nice change from all the sweet recipes I've been blogging. Thanks Mom. Wish I was home to taste it!

From Mom:
I made this incredible sweet potato soup. It's cheap to make and very tasty. The soup has a slight heat from the cayenne pepper. I never tasted the peanut butter but your dad said he did, but only in the first bite. I cut recipe right in half and it made plenty of soup for us two for dinner. This was better than any pumpkin soup I've tasted but I'm wondering if we can't make pumpkin soup with these same ingredients or tweak them a bit. I'll have to think about it.

Mom also mentioned that she would cut back the cayenne pepper a bit if you don't like your soups too spicy and maybe the peanut butter to 1/4 a cup.

**UPDATE NOTE: 10/30/10 I made this soup today! I can't have a recipe on my blog that I haven't tried. I took moms advice and cut back the cayenne pepper to 1/4 tsp. It was still plenty spicy. And then the 1/4 cut of peanut butter was just fine. It still has a nice depth of nutty flavor, but didn't taste like peanut butter. I also made this today for a Halloween/Harvest dinner tomorrow, along with this soup. I made it and will reheat it tomorrow. Should work out and be very tasty.



The Recipe is from Ellie Krieger, of Food Network, but I can't get the link to work in this post. So here is the recipe:

Nutty Sweet Potato Soup:

Makes 6, 1 1/2 Cup servings
Ingredients

1 tablespoon canola oil
* 1 large onion, diced (about 2 cups)
* 1 medium red bell pepper, seeded and diced (about 1 cup)
* 2 medium carrots, diced (about 1 cup)
* 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
* 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
* 1 clove garlic, minced (about 1 teaspoon)
* 1 teaspoon peeled and grated fresh ginger
* 1 large sweet potato, peeled and cubed (2 cups)
* 6 cups low-sodium chicken broth or vegetable broth
* 1 (14.5-ounce) can no salt added diced tomatoes, with their juices
* 2/3 cup creamy natural peanut butter
* 2 teaspoons honey
* 1/2 cup chopped scallion greens (about 3 scallions)

Heat the oil in a large soup pot over a medium-high heat. Add the onions, bell pepper and carrots and cook, stirring until the vegetables soften, about 5 minutes. Add the cayenne, black pepper, garlic and ginger and cook for 1 minute more. Stir in the sweet potato, broth, and tomatoes and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer until the potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes.

*Puree the soup in the pot using an immersion blender or in a regular blender in 2 batches and return the soup to the pot. Add the peanut butter and honey and stir, over low heat, until the peanut butter melts. Serve warm, garnished with the scallions.

*When blending hot liquids: Remove liquid from the heat and allow to cool for at least 5 minutes. Transfer liquid to a blender or food processor and fill it no more than halfway. If using a blender, release one corner of the lid. This prevents the vacuum effect that creates heat explosions. Place a towel over the top of the machine, pulse a few times then process on high speed until smooth.

Per Serving:
Calories 290; Total Fat 18g (Sat Fat 3.5g, Mono Fat 9g, Poly Fat 5g); Protein 14g; Carb 23g; Fiber 5g; Cholesterol 0mg; Sodium 260mg