Sweet Potato and Fennel Soup
Do you like fennel?
Its intriguing shape and unique, slightly anise flavour? I love it, mostly because it’s healthy. Fennel is rich in antioxidants, which neutralise free radicals, and potassium lowers the blood pressure and protects blood vessels. Excellent for people with gastric problems, suffering from bloating and constipation (all you mums out there know what fennel tea is for), fennel is anti-cramping for the whole gastric system.
There are scientists who claim that eating fennel in any form, leaves, bulbs, teas or oils, can improve your mood.
Preparation
Slice the fennel along with the leek and fry them in a pan with coconut oil, adding thyme, salt and pepper. In a separate pot, cover the diced sweet potato with water. When the vegetables in the pan have gone soft, add them to the sweet potato pot and blend everything together. Boil it for a few more minutes, adding the rest of the spices and a few drops of vinegar.
I poured the soup into cups, added a few drops of chilli oil and slightly fried sunflower seeds. It was delicious.
How to prepare a fennel bulb
Cut off the stalks where they leave the bulb and keep the feathery fronds, which are the best garnish this soup can have and are usually thrown away. Halve the bulb from top to bottom, then cut out the solid triangle of core at the base, because it stays tough long after the rest has softened.
Slice what is left thinly, across the layers. A whole bulb looks like a lot of vegetable and cooks down to much less, which is why the recipe calls for two. The outer layer can be stringy on a large bulb, so peel it off the way you would with celery.
The anise taste goes away, mostly
If you have only eaten fennel raw in a salad, the aniseed hit is sharp and it puts a lot of people off. Cooking changes it completely: the volatile compounds that make it taste of liquorice break down with heat, and what is left is sweet and mild, closer to a very gentle onion.
That is the reason the fennel goes into the pan first and is cooked until genuinely soft, not just translucent. Ten to fifteen minutes on low heat with the leek is right. Rush this step and the raw anise carries through the blended soup, where there is nowhere for it to hide.
Sweet potato is the body of the soup
There is no cream, no stock and no flour in this recipe, so the sweet potato is doing all the work of texture. Blended, its starch gives the soup the thickness that would otherwise need dairy, and its sweetness balances the fennel.
Cover the cubes with water and no more. The sweet potato cooking water goes into the blender with everything else, so a generous pot gives you a thin soup, and the only remedy afterwards is boiling it down. Cut the cubes evenly, around two centimetres, so they cook through at the same rate.
The vinegar at the end is not optional
A few drops of apple vinegar go in after blending, and they are what stops this being a flat, sweet purée. Fennel is sweet, sweet potato is sweeter, and coconut oil rounds everything off, so without an acid at the end the soup has nothing to push against.
Add it off the boil and taste. The same goes for the chilli oil at the table: a few drops on the surface of each cup, not stirred into the pot, so the heat arrives in bursts rather than evenly. Fry the sunflower seeds dry and scatter them at the last moment, since they soften within minutes in hot soup.
Keeping it
The soup keeps three days in the fridge and thickens there, so loosen it with water when reheating. It freezes well for three months, best without the chilli oil and seeds, which go on after reheating.
If you would rather have vegetable dinners like this one planned into the week with a shopping list, that is what the Diet & Training by Ann app does.
Sweet potato and fennel soup
Ingredients
Method
- Trim the fennel, cut out the core and slice the bulbs thinly, keeping the fronds for garnish.
- Fry the fennel with the sliced leek in coconut oil over low heat with thyme, salt and pepper, for 10 to 15 minutes, until genuinely soft.
- In a separate pot, cover the diced sweet potato with water and boil until tender.
- Add the pan vegetables to the sweet potato pot and blend everything together.
- Boil for a few more minutes, adding the rest of the spices and a few drops of apple vinegar off the boil.
- Pour into cups and finish with a few drops of chilli oil and dry-fried sunflower seeds.
Notes
Frequently asked questions
Cut the stalks off where they leave the bulb and keep the feathery fronds for garnish. Halve the bulb from top to bottom and cut out the solid triangle of core at the base, because it stays tough long after the rest has softened. Then slice thinly across the layers.
No, as long as the fennel is properly cooked. The compounds that give raw fennel its sharp liquorice taste break down with heat, leaving something sweet and mild. Give it 10 to 15 minutes on low heat with the leek, until genuinely soft rather than just translucent.
The sweet potato. There is no cream, stock or flour in the recipe, so its starch does all the work of texture and its sweetness balances the fennel. Cover the cubes with water and no more, since that cooking water goes into the blender too.
Because fennel is sweet, sweet potato is sweeter and coconut oil rounds everything off, so without an acid the soup is a flat, sweet puree. A few drops of apple vinegar off the boil give it something to push against.
Three days in the fridge, where it thickens, so loosen it with water when reheating. It freezes for three months, best without the chilli oil and sunflower seeds, which go on after reheating since they soften within minutes in hot soup. Vegetable dinners like this one come planned into the week with a shopping list in the Diet & Training by Ann app.
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