Great greens blender soup

I love a good blender soup. Especially when it's also the world’s quickest and easiest freezer fix. This soup uses frozen peas and frozen spinach, and shows your freezer staples can make delicious meals.

Credit: Mary Makes It Easy

• serves

  4

• prep

  10 minutes

• cook

  10 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

Ingredients

• 1 pkg (250 g) frozen spinach, thawed in fridge overnight
• 3½ cups frozen peas, thawed in fridge overnight
• 4 cups (1L) low sodium vegetable broth
• 3 tsp (15 ml) olive oil
• 3 green onions, roughly chopped
• kosher salt, to taste
• freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 2 garlic cloves, grated
• ⅓ cup roughly chopped flat leaf parsley
• ¼ cup roughly chopped fine herbs, such as basil, mint, tarragon, chives or more parsley
• 1 lemon, zested and juiced
• ¼ cup (25 g) finely grated Pecorino cheese, plus more for serving, optional
• Sour cream, plain yogurt or crème fraiche, for garnish, optional

Instructions

1. Drain the spinach through a fine mesh sieve, pressing gently to remove most of the water and transfer it along with the peas to a blender.
2. Meanwhile, pour the vegetable broth into a medium saucepan and bring to a simmer. In a skillet, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. Add in the green onions, season with salt and pepper and cook just until bright green and starting to lightly colour, about 2 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the garlic, allowing the residual heat from the pan to lightly cook the garlic for about 30 seconds; transfer to the blender. Add the herbs, lemon zest, lemon juice and 3 cups of the hot broth.
3. Place the lid on the blender, remove the vent cap, cover with a kitchen towel and blend on high until smooth. Add in the Pecorino cheese, if using. Season to taste with more salt, pepper and lemon juice. For a thinner soup, add more stock. Blend to combine.
4. Serve as is topped with sour cream, yogurt or crème fraiche and Pecorino cheese, if using. This soup can also be served chilled or heated to a higher temperature though additional heating might tone down the bright green colour.

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.