Creamy Carrot Soup With Star Anise

Submitted by COOKGIRl

"From Bon Appetit 2005. Comforting and delicious! For presentation, garnish each soup serving with a whole star anise if desired."

 

• Ready In: 30mins
• Ingredients: 10
• Serves: 6-8

ingredients

• 3 tablespoons butter
• 1 1⁄2 cups white onions, chopped
• 5 whole star anise
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 large garlic clove, chopped
• 1 lb organic carrot, peeled and chopped into 1-inch pieces
• 4 cups fresh stock
• 6 chives, stems minced
• salt, to taste
• white pepper, to taste

directions

1. In large stock pot over medium heat melt the butter. Add chopped onion, 3 star anise, bay leaves and garlic. Saute until the onion starts to soften and glisten, about 5 minutes.
2. Add the carrots and fresh stock. Cover, bring to boil and simmer until carrots are very tender, approximately 30 minutes.
3. Remove star anise and bay leaves. Using an immersion blender puree the soup until very smooth. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
4. Take the remaining star anise and grind to a fine powder. Stir a little into the soup. Adjust seasoning and add more star anise to taste. Stir in the fresh minced chives.
5. Serve hot.

Reviews

[La Dilettante]

Just home from a trip to Ireland, and wanted to replicate a carrot-anise soup we enjoyed at La Cave, a French wine bar in Dublin. This is pretty close, although I used half milk/half veg stock for the liquid. Yummers!

 

[Elisabetta47]

DH was the only hold out on this yummy soup (he is anti-sweet except in desserts). The best part was that my 14 yr. old DS, who only seems to eat meat or bread these days, enjoyed a bowlful. Reviewer Parsley is right...this is a great kid's soup. I made as directed, using fresh vegetable stock. Think this would be a wonderful starter for Thanksgiving dinner or any meal you want to kick off with a twist.

 

[Annacia]

I just got home from a road trip tonight and wanted something after restaurant fare for 4 days. This fit what I was looking for perfectly, it's light of the tummy and wonderful on the taste buds. I stopped at the organic market coming home and my purchases included some great looking carrots and dehydrated veggie stock, how fortuitous. As I'm a long standing fan of anise I was pretty sure that I was going to like this soup. I was wrong, I didn't like it, I just loved it. I loved it totally, happily and whole heartedly. I used roasted garlic puree and skipped the white pepper because a taste before adding it told me that it was perfection in orange at that point and why would I mess with perfection?

 

[Chiquante]

Yummy, even without the bay leaves and chives! (I didn't have any) I substituted some of the contents of a fennel tea bag for the star anise (again, I didn't have it--don't worry, it's just fennel seeds in a tea bag) and it was still good. Thanks for a great (and adaptable) recipe!

 

[Patchwork Dragon]

Fabulous...loved the unusual flavour from the star anise.