The Healthy Cooking Coach

Got Broccoli? Try Creamy Broccoli Avocado Soup

You don’t see billboards promoting it. It’s just not as profitable as processed foods. But don’t let that stop you from eating more of it! Broccoli’s a great source of powerful polyphenols that have anticancer properties, slow down the aging process, and reduce the risk of cataracts, macular degeneration, and other diseases of civilization.

One cup of raw broccoli contains 567 IU of betacarotene, 81 mg of vitamin C, 92 mg of vitamin K, 57 mcg of folate, 42 mg of calcium, 60 mg of phosphorus, 288 mg of potassium, 2.5 grams of fiber, all for only 30 calories. Cooking it makes more of the carotenes and iron available for absorption. It also makes this cruciferous vegetable more digestible.

If you’ve grown tired of steamed or stir fried broccoli (or you routinely overcook it), don’t give up on this brassica family vegetable. There’s another way to eat it! Marry it with simmered onions, garlic, cumin, ground chipotle and avocado, another super nutritious food, in a creamy soup. If you like gaucamole, you’ll love this soup. The key here is to cook the broccoli without overcooking it and to leave the lid off the pot after you’ve pureed all of the ingredients, lest it turn a dingy gray color and become bitter.

My students, clients, and friends love this recipe. In my Whole Foods Cuisine course at SWIHA (Southwest Institute of Healing Arts) in Tempe, my students makes and serve it with Tuscan Chicken Casserole, Roasted Sweet Potato Fries and Silver Dollar Sweet Potatoes, with Dark Chocolate Dipped Date Nut Truffles as a finale. The soup also pairs well with baked, broiled, roasted or grilled salmon or pork and Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Lime (other recipes you can find in my Garden of Eating cookbook).

If you’d like to watch me make this soup, step by step, here's my YouTube video, a sampling of one of 18 cooking videos on my newly released set of two cooking DVDs.

Creamy Broccoli-Avocado Soup 

Prep: 30 minutes/ Cooking: 30 minutes/ Yield: 6 servings

Avocado adds a rich taste and creamy texture to green vegetable soups without milk or cream. I got the idea for this from the California Avocado Commission. I replaced zucchini in their recipe with broccoli, increased the volume of vegetables, and changed the seasonings. This soup goes well with fish, poultry, or meat with a bright orange, yellow, or red vegetable or fruit. Baked corn tortilla chips would make a great accompaniment.

Ingredients

• 4 cups homemade Bone-Building Broth (from The Garden of Eating), homemade chicken broth or stock, or preservative-free chicken broth or stock
• 1 medium onion (1-1 1/2 cups), thinly sliced or diced
• 2 to 3 small cloves of garlic, coarsely chopped
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon unrefined sea salt (Celtic or Redmond Real Salt are best; reduce by one-half if using salted broth, then adjust upwards as needed), or to taste
• ½ to 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/3 to 1/2 teaspoon ground chipotle (smoked dried Jalapeno pepper powder)
• 3 to 4 packed cups broccoli, tops cut into small florets, stalks peeled and thinly sliced, tough part discarded
• 2 large ripe (but not mushy) avocados, seeded, peeled, and chopped
• 1/4 cup minced scallions, parsley or cilantro leaves, or red or yellow bell pepper, garnish
• Hot sauce or ground black pepper or lemon pepper, optional

 

1. Combine broth or stock, onion, garlic, sea salt, cumin, and chipotle in a 2- to 3-quart pot. Cover and bring to boil over high heat. Reduce heat to medium or medium-low and simmer for 15 minutes.
2. Add the broccoli and bring to boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer until fork tender, about 15 minutes. Do not boil hard or overcook. Broccoli should remain bright green.
3. Purée broccoli, onion, and broth mixture with the avocadoes in a blender, Vita-Mix, or food processor in 2 batches, until smooth and creamy. Add additional water ¼ cup at a time as needed to make a smooth purée. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.
4. Return the soup to the pot and heat gently. Do not cover! Ladle into bowls, garnish, and serve. Add hot sauce or black pepper at the table if desired. Served chilled in hot weather.
5. Refrigerate leftovers and use within 3 days. Heat gently without boiling.

1 cup: 149 calories, 4 g protein, 11 g carbohydrate (6 g fiber), 10 g fat, 37 mg calcium, 174 mg sodium

Variations:

*    For a milder flavor, omit chipotlé. Add 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper or lemon and 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg.

SOURCE: The Garden of Eating: A Produce-Dominated Diet & Cookbook by Rachel Albert & Don Matesz available at Changing Hands Books, Healing Pages Books, Chakra 4 Herb & Tea House or online using my secure online server.

If you would like to buy my cooking DVD set so you can watch me make 18 recipes, see eight cooking techniques, and get tons of tips to help you healthy and delicious meals, click here for more information or to order.

Organizing Your Recipes

Do you clip recipes from magazines, file them away, then forget to make them or wonder where you put them? Since I’m always looking for new ideas for myself, my cooking classes, and future cookbooks, I needed to find a way to make order of all the recipes I’m collecting. I found two systems that work for me.

Short term files: I use letter size folders with tabs marked “recipes to test.” If I have a lot of recipes in single category, I make separate files, such as “quinoa recipes,” or “dessert recipes.” I keep these in a file cabinet or in an upright metal file rack for easy access.

Long-term keeping: A few years ago I filled several 3-ring binders filled with plastic sheet protectors. I insert divider pages with tabs, then organized the recipes by category: salads, leafy greens, root vegetables, tubers, soups, whole grains, fish, poultry, meat, eggs, condiments, fruits, desserts, beverages.  I cut out short recipes and paste them on paper. If they have pictures, I include those. I slip the pages into a sheet protectors and keep the notebooks on a shelf and continually add to them.  If I'm looking for inspiration or ideas or ways to use a particular food, I pull out a notebook.

Periodically I pull recipes out of a file folder or notebook and place them in an 8 1/2 x 11 plastic envelope––- the kind with a Velcro closure––- and place them in the kitchen ready for action. If I want to make a recipe in the next week or two, I post it on the refrigerator with a magnet. 

Last weekend I pulled this recipe out of my files. I liked it so much I made it twice, once with carrots, once with without. Once with  homemade Bone Building Broth, made from leftover chicken bones I'd saved. I’ll post that recipe in the next week or two. For the second batch I used the liquid saved from cooking a chicken in the crock pot. I hate to waste food and this gelatinous broth added a lot of flavor and cut my food bill.

Here’s the recipe with a few adjustments I made.

Immune Booster Soup

Prep: 20 minutes    Cooking: 20 minutes      Yield: 4 to 6 servings

The original recipe appeared in the December 2008 issue of Yoga Journal and was provided  by Debra Brammer, N.D., associate clinical dean of naturopathic medicine at Bastyr Center for Natural Health.

I added quick cooking wakame sea vegetables and miso to her recipe. Sea vegetables add important trace minerals to your diet. They nourish your thyroid gland and help chelate (detoxify) heavy metals. I used quick cooking wakame, sold in the Asian food section of natural foods stores. If you use regular wakame or alaria, you will need to soak it, finely chop it, and simmer it for 15 to 20 minutes before you add the other ingredients.

Note: Since I used unsalted homemade broth, I seasoned the soup with miso just before serving. Read labels carefully. You want unpasteurized, refrigerated miso, a Japanese seasoning paste that makes a great substitute for salt or soy sauce in soups. If you avoid gluten, select a brand and flavor of miso that does not contain barley, such as Westbrae. Or, try some of the gluten-free, wood-fired, handmade miso from South River Miso Company. Miso lasts for years if kept in a cool dry place. I'll give you more tips for using it in future posts.

Ingredients:
4 cups mushroom or chicken broth or homemade Bone-Building Broth
1 small yellow or white onion, cut into thin half-moons or crescents (about 1 cup)
4 to 10 cloves of garlic, crushed and chopped
1 medium carrot, grated or cut into thin rounds or half moon slices
4 to 8 fresh or dried shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
1 to 3 tablespoons peeled and grated gingerroot or to taste
3 tablespoons Emerald Cove Ready-to-Use Pacific Wakame or Eden Wakame Flakes
1 fresh lemon, juiced
3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or scallions
4 to 6 teaspoons unpasteurized miso: white, yellow, mellow, or red miso (see note above), optional (omit if using salted broth)


1. If using dried mushrooms, place them in a bowl. Add hot water to barely cover. Put a smaller bowl on top to submerge them in the liquid. Let soak until tender, at least 15 minutes, then thinly slice with a knife or kitchen shears. Discard the tough end of the stem. Strain the soaking liquid to remove sediment and add it to the soup.

2. Cover and bring the broth, onion, garlic, carrot, mushrooms, and ginger to a slow boil in a 2-quart pot.

3. Add instant or quick cooking wakame sea vegetable. Reduce the heat, and simmer on low, covered, for about 15 minutes, until the vegetables become tender.

3. Remove from heat. Add the lemon juice and parsley. Cover and let steep for 5 minutes. If you did not use salted broth, add 1 teaspoon of miso to each soup bowl. Ladle in some of the soup broth, mash to dissolve the miso, then add more soup to the bowl. Stir, taste, and adjust as needed.

4. Refrigerate leftovers in glass jars. Heat gently before serving. Season with miso if desired.