Aunt Cathys Pea Soup Recipes

GRANDMA'S PEA SOUP

Steps:

• Cover peas with water and soak overnight. Drain, rinse and place in a Dutch oven. , Add ham bone, water and remaining soup ingredients except sausage and dumplings. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer 2 to 2-1/2 hours. , Remove ham bone and skim fat. Remove meat from bone; dice. Add ham and, if desired, sausage to pan. , For dumplings, place flour in a small bowl. Make a depression in the center of the flour; add egg and water and stir until smooth. , Place a colander with 3/16-in.-diameter holes over simmering soup; transfer dough to the colander and press through with a wooden spoon. Cook, uncovered, 10-15 minutes. Discard bay leaf. Freeze Option: Prepare soup without dumplings and freeze in serving-size portions to enjoy for months to come.

FRESH PEA SOUP

Steps:

• Heat the butter in a large saucepan, add the leeks and onion, and cook over medium-low heat for 5 to 10 minutes, until the onion is tender. Add the chicken stock, increase the heat to high, and bring to a boil. Add the peas and cook for 3 to 5 minutes, until the peas are tender. (Frozen peas will take only 3 minutes.) Off the heat, add the mint, salt, and pepper.
• *Puree the soup in batches: place 1 cup of soup in a blender, place the lid on top, and puree on low speed. With the blender still running, open the venthole in the lid and slowly add more soup until the blender is three-quarters full. Pour the soup into a large bowl and repeat until all the soup is pureed. Whisk in the creme fraiche and chives and taste for seasoning. Serve hot with garlic croutons.

FRENCH-CANADIAN PEA SOUP (SOUPE AUX POIS)

Steps:

• Wash and sort peas; place in a large pot, bring to a boil.
• Remove from heat and let sit for 1 hour.
• Add salt pork, onion, celery, carrots, savory and 1 tsp salt.
• Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer until peas are very tender, about 2 hours, adding more water if needed.
• Remove salt pork; chop and return to soup.
• Season to taste with salt and pepper.

SNERT (SPLIT PEA SOUP)

Steps:

• Place dried split peas, ham hock, and bacon into slow cooker; pour in chicken broth and 3 1/2 cups water.
• Cover cooker and cook on High until peas are tender and broken apart, 3 to 4 hours. Stir in more water as needed to prevent soup from burning on the bottom. Stir occasionally throughout cooking.
• Stir potatoes, carrots, leek, onion, celery, and garlic into soup; mix in more water, if needed. Cover and cook soup on High for 2 more hours.
• Season with salt, black pepper, thyme, nutmeg, and cloves; mix sausage slices into soup. Cover and cook 2 more hours to blend the flavors.

CREAM OF CASHEW PEA SOUP

Steps:

• Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-low. Add onions, celery, and garlic and cook, stirring often and adding a splash or so of water if the bottom of pan gets too brown, until golden brown, 30-40 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Add cashews, sugar, red pepper flakes, and 3 cups water and bring mixture to a simmer. Cook until vegetables are very soft and losing their structure, 10-15 minutes.
• Blend one-third of sugar snap peas with one-third of vegetable mixture in a blender, adding some cooking liquid from vegetable mixture as needed to thin, until very smooth, about 2 minutes. Press purée through a fine-mesh sieve into a medium saucepan; discard solids. Working in 2 batches, repeat with remaining peas and vegetable mixture, adding water as needed if you run out of cooking liquid. If soup is still very thick, thin with water until you get a velvety, pourable consistency. (You should have about 7 cups soup.)
• Stir vinegar into soup; season with more salt and pepper and warm over medium-low until heated through.
• Serve soup topped with scallions and potato chips.
• Do Ahead
• Soup can be made 2 days ahead. Let cool; cover and chill. Reheat over medium-low, thinning with water as needed until pourable.

CHILLED SUGAR SNAP PEA SOUP

Steps:

• Pour olive oil into a large pot, set over medium heat, and add leeks to hot oil. Season leeks with a pinch of salt. Cook, stirring often, until leeks are soft, 5 to 6 minutes. Pour chicken broth into leeks; bring to a boil. Season with black pepper and cayenne pepper.
• Stir peas into boiling broth mixture and add 2 mint leaves. Bring back to a boil and cook until peas are bright green and have started to soften, 5 to 6 minutes.
• Turn off heat; use a slotted spoon to transfer vegetables into a large blender, leaving liquid in pot. Pour half the liquid from the pot into the blender, place a folded towel on the blender lid, and pulse a few times to chop vegetables. Blend at high speed to puree vegetables. Add remaining liquid from pot to blender and liquefy the soup until smooth.
• Pour soup from blender into a fine mesh strainer set over a bowl and use a spatula to push soup through the strainer, leaving the tough fibrous material behind.
• Cool soup to room temperature, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled, about 3 hours.
• Season cold soup with salt and adjust cayenne pepper. Ladle soup into a serving bowl. Spoon creme fraiche into a plastic squeeze bottle and squeeze the creme fraiche over the top of the soup in a loose spiral. Use a skewer to pull the spiral into flower petal shapes, starting from the middle and quickly pulling the skewer through the creme to make pointed petal shapes. Serve garnished with strips of fresh mint.

AUNT CATHY'S PEA SOUP

Steps:

• Boil ham bone for 1 hour, remove bone. Add soup mix. When dissolved add everything else and cook on low until peas are completely desolved. For thicker soup leave to cook down, for thinner soup add more water. Salt, pepper, garlic, to taste.