Pea Soup

Since I've been on a continuous pantry-raid for the last two weeks, I've finally made some new dishes with some of the ingredients I've been meaning to use...since I bought them months and months and months ago. Seeing as how it's winter in Winnipeg and we've settled into some pretty chilly temperatures, hearty soups have been on my mind a lot.

Pea soup is one of my favourite soups but one that I had never made before. There are few soups that make me think of staying cozy in Winnipeg more than pea soup. Maybe it's because the taste is so homey or maybe it's because it always makes me think of the Festival Du Voyageur (kicking off in just over two weeks) and their Pea Soup contest - whatever the reason, it's always been one of my comfort foods.

So finally, after buying dried split peas last winter and storing them safely in our ice box (not the freezer but the literal original ice box we use as a cupboard in our kitchen) I pulled them out last week and decided to try my hand at my first ever pea soup. Now I know traditionally ham and pea soup go hand in hand, but to be honest, I've never been a fan of this. I took the much less traditional route of using chicken stock - because I had a bunch homemade in my freezer - but you can use any type of stock you want. I actually ran out of chicken stock and had to use a bit of a veggie bouillon cube but it all worked out.

Split Pea Soup

• 2 cups dried split peas
• 2 carrots, diced
  
• 2 celery stocks, diced
  
• 1 small-med onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 quarts stock (chicken, veggie)
• 1 tbsp thyme
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tsp olive oil

Heat the olive oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add onions and celery and saute until translucent and soft. Add garlic, stir for 1-2 minutes without browning. Add carrots, peas, thyme, stock, and salt and pepper to taste (I had forgotten to salt my stock when I made it so I had to use a lot of salt - add a bit and taste and adjust as necessary). Bring stock to a boil and reduce heat to a simmer, stirring occasionally. Simmer for 40-60 minutes, until veggies and peas are soft.

Now, I'm one of those who says that pea soup MUST be blended, thick, and creamy. I'm always slightly disappointed when I order a pea soup that hasn't been blended as a last step and instead is more of a broth pea soup. Luckily for me, I was given a handy-dandy immersion blender for Christmas! Once my soup was cooked I just immersion-blended it to my consistency and let it sit another 10 minutes.

If you don't have an immersion blender you can go one of 3 ways here:
1) Potato masher - won't be as smooth but gives you more consistency.
2) Let the soup cool (very important!) and put it in either a counter-top blender or a food processor.
3) Skip the blending and keep it as a more brothy pea soup (blasphemy!)

This soup lasted us all through the week and made about...6 servings. Frankly, I'm surprised it lasted as long as it did because it was divine.