soup, it's what's for dinner

so, i was originally planning on making a big pot of spicy vegetable curry or else a sweeter pumpkin / sweet potato curry this week, but i changed my mind.

to follow up on last week's heartier meals (french onion soup with cognac and hearty beef stew), i decided to slightly tweak a recipe from 101 cookbooks for a couscous soup with vegetables.

i have a good amount of leftover broth in my freezer from when i made tom yum soup this winter with sj, that i'm going to defrost to use as the base for this super simple soup. the broth has quite a kick, with a thai bird chili and lemongrass flavor.

the basics for this soup are as follows:

- start with a great tasting stock (veggie, usually. i'm switching it up with the aforementioned broth). heat the broth with a few Tb. of good extra virgin olive oil, and a few crushed red pepper flakes (i'm leaving this out since my broth is already kicked up a few notches)
- bring the broth to a boil, then remove from the heat, and add a box of couscous. wait about 2 minutes.
- after those 2 minutes, stir in broccoli and cauliflower (cut into bite sized pieces, about 1.5 cups of each for a 6-7 gallon batch, but more the merrier). then wait another 2 minutes.
- after that, ready to ladle into soup bowls, topping with some finely chopped sun dried tomatoes and a few crumbles of goat cheese and green onions. voila!

heidi @ 101 cookbooks offers some wonderful variations for the broth -- adding curry paste, harissa, or like i'm trying, using a different stock altogether.

i can't believe i haven't thought of this sort of concoction before. my curries are going to have to wait a few days ... ;)