The Memsahib's Mulligatawny Soup: Anglo-Indian Curried Soup

"The British have always been fond of highly spiced food, a taste which can be traced back in our cooking to medieval times and which can be seen today in our pungent commercially prepared sauces and mustards. This tasty curried broth belongs to the early nineteenth century and is part of the heritage of the British Raj. British people who spent years in India grew to love the local spicy food and brought back their favourite recipes which were adapted in the Victorian kitchen. "Pepper Water" was the nearest thing to soup in the cuisine of India, and indeed the word mulligatawny comes from the Tamil words molegoo (pepper) and tunes (water). It was originally a vegetarian 'sauce', but the British added meat and various other ingredients to create a variety of mulligatawnies, which were popular in India and Ceylon, but had an extremely bad press back home in England! A basic peppered water was flavoured with various other ingredients, then the soup would be served with side bowls of cooked rice, lime wedges, grated coconut, snippets of fried bacon, quartered hard-boiled eggs and sliced chillies. You helped yourself to what you wanted - a meal in itself. I serve mine with Raita and Chutney, and sometimes hard-boiled eggs, you can add whatever you like to the basic soup posted below. This recipe was taken from The Memsahib's Cookbook and has been adapted to personal taste."
 
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photo by breezermom photo by breezermom
photo by breezermom
photo by JustJanS photo by JustJanS
photo by French Tart photo by French Tart
photo by French Tart photo by French Tart
photo by French Tart photo by French Tart
Ready In:
35mins
Ingredients:
26
Serves:
6
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ingredients

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directions

  • Simmer all the basic soup ingredients together for 15 to 25 minutes.
  • Then add all, or any of the flavouring ingredients - to make the soup exactly as you like it.
  • (Flavouring ingredients are listed above.).
  • Cook over a gentle heat for a further 5 to 10 minutes.
  • Serve hot with any of the side dishes as described above.

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Reviews

  1. Excellent! I have made mulligatawny many times using coconut milk and chicken broth -- but the coconut cream makes all the difference. So rich and creamy! Look for it in your health food store - I found it by the coconut oil jars.<br/><br/>It's raining buckets here, for days on end. Today I made a big pot of chicken stock, simmering on the stove all day, and used it tonight to make this soup. We topped it with chopped red onion, some raisins, and some sliced almonds. Perfect!
     
  2. Wonderful taste! I used red curry paste, and added in some chopped chicken, roast beef, the apples, onions, rice, and chutney. I couldn't find coconut cream, so I bought a can of full coconut milk, and scooped out the thickened part, which did amount to just over the required 7 oz.....it seemed to work out well. Really loved this soup! Thanks for sharing.
     
  3. DH and I really enjoyed this soup! It is very different from what we are used to. I had to make a couple of changes due to what was in the house. I used homemade turkey stock and had to leave out (unfortunately) the chutney and cardamom. I used 3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts that I had gently poached. This will be made again during the winter months. I served it with "recipe#181281". Thank you for sharing this lovely soup!!!
     
  4. I've been craving mulligatawny for some time now so I finally made it today for our lunch. This wasn't like any mulligatawny I remember, but maybe somethings are better forgotten I've decided. I cooked off the apple and onion until softened and lightly browned, then added in the spices and finally the liquid. I can't remember when I saw creamed coconut here so used a tin of light coconut cream instead-it worked well. After simmering for 25 minutes, I added in about a cup of cooked rice and the meat of a chicken leg (thigh and drumstick) and cooked a further 5 minutes. We ate this with a generous dollop of minted yoghurt which worked will with the spicy, sweetish soup. I feel like cooking some rice and another chook just to make this again for lunch tomorrow.
     
  5. We loved this soup. For the basic soup, we substituted a can of coconut milk for the coconut cream, thanks to Gerry 999 for that hint, and added some rotisserie chicken that I bought to save time. We added onions and apples sauteed in butter and zucchini. The kids loved this with a little dollop of plain greek yogurt on top. Thank you, French Tart!
     
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Tweaks

  1. We loved this soup. For the basic soup, we substituted a can of coconut milk for the coconut cream, thanks to Gerry 999 for that hint, and added some rotisserie chicken that I bought to save time. We added onions and apples sauteed in butter and zucchini. The kids loved this with a little dollop of plain greek yogurt on top. Thank you, French Tart!
     

RECIPE SUBMITTED BY

<p><strong><span>The sunflowers in the field behind my house in SW France:</span></strong></p> <p><img title=Sunflowers src=http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r271/copperhorse58/DSCN8221.jpg alt=Sunflowers width=640 height=480 /><br /><strong><span><br /><br />I am British (English-Scottish), but I was born in South Africa and have lived all over the world, including Hong Kong, Germany, Cyprus, USA &amp; Singapore. I have also been very fortunate to have travelled extensively over the years.........I still have wanderlust! <br /><br />I used to be an English Literature &amp; Art History teacher &amp; lecturer; before that, I trained and worked as a Graphic Designer for many years. I now live in France with my husband &amp; my daughter who has just started university in September 2006. We also have one very chatty Burmese cat Willow, who allows us to live with her here! (I used to have three cats, I recently lost Monty, a beautiful seal point Siamese and before that, Rama, who was a debonair blue point Siamese cat - I would love to have another Siamese cat or cats in the future!)</span></strong></p> <p><em><strong><span>This is my Burmese Cat, Willow, sunning herself on the log pile in the kitchen garden:</span></strong></em></p> <p><strong><img title=My src=http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r271/copperhorse58/ABaconButtyandSundryFoodPhotos34.jpg alt=My width=640 height=480 /></strong></p> <p><strong><span>Here is my lovely Monty, a seal point Siamese, and Willow, sitting&nbsp;in the kitchen garden last year, and a few months before Monty died; he was 18yrs old:</span></strong></p> <p><img title=Monty src=http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r271/copperhorse58/AbsolutelySinfulStickyToffeePudding.jpg alt=Monty width=640 height=480 />My</p> <p><strong><span>This is my wonderful old boy, Rama, a blue-point Siamese, who died when he was 20yrs old - excuse the old and much sellotaped photo:</span></strong></p> <p><img title=Rama src=http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r271/copperhorse58/Rama1stOctober2004164.jpg alt=Rama width=517 height=639 /></p> <p><strong><span>My favourite pastimes are: reading, writing, painting &amp; drawing, photography, gardening, anything creative, walking, travelling, dining out and of course COOKING! I love all types of cuisine, but especially Traditional British - and NO it is NOT all bad!! I particularly love food associated with the changing seasons plus traditional feasts &amp; festivals, as well as Slow Cooking. I also enjoy French &amp; North African cuisine, come to think of it, there isn't much I don't like! <br /><br />My husband &amp; I run a Chambres D'Hotes, (Bed and Breakfast) called Auberge de la Fontaine here in beautiful South West France; we specialise in Gourmet Food &amp; Wine Breaks, French Antiques &amp; Restoration courses, French Language courses and French Cookery classes. Our home is completely furnished with Antique French furniture that we have rescued &amp; restored ourselves. 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