There is a certain chill in the air, a little nip that starts sneaking in come October in most parts of the world, and India is no exception. As the weather slowly turns from monsoon to winter, autumn season brings in some cold winds and plenty of reasons to curl up under a light blanket and enjoy a bowl of soup. Warm, nutritious and packed with flavours, soups turn into the comfort food of the season once autumn season is here. And yet, many people shy away from making it at home.
The reason behind this is quite simple actually. When you order in some soup or taste it at a restaurant, you might get a more flavoursome concoction that is also thick (but not cornflour thick). While, at home, people mostly end up making watery soups that are neither that enjoyable nor loaded with flavours. The reason why this happens, especially during autumn and winter months is that most people tend to make soups in a hurry and expect the results to be magnificent. The fact is, like most dishes, soups take plenty of love and care while preparing.
Now, if you are thinking that giving soups all that much time to get ready defeats the purpose of this exercise, or that making soups at home is therefore difficult, worry not. With a few handy tips and tricks at hand, you can easily make the best soups of autumn season with utter ease at home. Here are all the tips you need to make heartwarming, nutritious and flavour-loaded soups this autumn.
Video Credit: YouTube/Hebbars Kitchen
Embrace Seasonal Ingredients
You might think of a few staples like pumpkin and tomatoes when it comes to soups, but the fact is, the more varieties of vegetables you add, the better the flavour. Explore seasonal vegetables like gourds, sweet potatoes, carrots, peas and greens. You could also experiment with seasonal fruit soups like apples and pears. The only limit here is your imagination.
Roast For Better Flavour
You might think that simply cooking veggies and pureeing them works as a soup base. But you’d be wrong. Roasting or caramelizing slices of the vegetables, whether they are pumpkins or apples or onions, can add a lot of smokey flavours to the soup with utter ease. The soup also becomes richer and darker in colour.
Incorporate Spices And Herbs
Simply because most soup recipes, especially non-Indian ones, call for just salt and pepper does not mean that you should also limit yourselves to just these flavour additions while making soups at home. Instead, utilise every spice and herb in your kitty, from simple cumin and fennel to nutmeg, ginger, cinnamon and more. When it comes to herbs, try dried as well as fresh ones.
Experiment With Broths
Don’t just make a soup with water as a base because it will only thin out all the collective flavours of the ingredients. Instead, use vegetable, chicken or meat broths because these can add to the flavours and meld well with all the other ingredients too. If you are vegetarian or vegan, you could also try a coconut milk-based broth that simply adds another level of complexity to the soup.
Add Proteins
Even a plain and simple pumpkin soup can be elevated to new levels of sophistication and flavours if you add a few proteins to the soup. If you are non-vegetarian, add chicken, eggs, fish, prawns and turkey—but not ingredients like sausages unless they are unprocessed and spices. If you are vegetarian or vegan, try adding beans, lentils, quinoa, nuts and even some tofu or paneer to the soup depending on your preferences.
Slow Cook The Soup
Yes, soups can indeed be made in a hurry, but the best soups are cooked for hours to enhance the depth of flavours of the ingredients. Just add plenty of broth, puree, herbs, spices and proteins, and let the soup simmer for an hour at least. If you are indeed in a hurry, make the soup in a pressure cooker to get those dum flavours in a quick span of time, but don’t make a soup in an open, uncovered pot on a high flame.
Always Make Extra
There is nothing easier in the world than making a slow-cooked, flavoursome soup in an extra-large batch. Know why? It’s simply because extra soups can always be frozen and stored away in the refrigerator for another day. Unless you have used milk, meat or seafood in the soup, any soup can be frozen and good to go for a week. So, always make some more than you need.
Don’t Miss Garnishes
A soup made with love, care and plenty of ingredients will always taste great, but what can elevate each bowl of soup to extraordinary levels are the garnishes, especially at home. Adding a few chopped herbs, a spoonful of sour cream or butter is very easy to do, and you can always make croutons with leftover bread. If you have them, then add toasted nuts and seeds for that extra punch of protein too.