Come For The Daring Bakers Challenge, Stay For Diann’s Soup!

This is my first skipped challenge. I hated to do it, but I decided to sit this one out, literally, because my broken foot has really slowed me down this month. I’ve been perfecting my “balance on one leg & stir” technique to make good on my prior baking commitments (ie: recipe testing for not-yet-published cookbooks for really groovy blogging friends), but trimming off some of the “extras” was deemed necessary.

You can bet your boots that I’ll be visiting my Daring Baker buddies to look at their lovely Caramel Cakes, (a recipe by Shauna Fish Lydon), and I bid you visit the Daring Bakers Blogroll to do the same! I would also like to thank this month’s trio of hosts: Jenny of Foray Into Food, Alex of Brownie and Blondie and Dolores of Culinary Curiosity. Choosing a challenge recipe, and spending time of the forums answering questions and double checking recipe details is a chunk of work and even if I didn’t make the cake this month, I will give it a shot at some point, so thanks for your hard work!

But wait, don’t run off just yet! I have something delicious to share with you!

Fit vegan super-mum and nurse Diann posted a recipe for Samosa Soup in the wake of a literal samosa take-over of the vegan blogosphere, and I decided that indeed, resistance *was* futile, and caved to the goodness. As many of you know, it’s always a treat when Diann posts a recipe, and I set to peeling and washing the veg, etc., humming as I went, happy to have a delicious and rather easy meal to prepare, Guppy and Monsieur Fish were listening to the new Cure album playing in the living room…life was good.

Samosa Stuffing Goodness with Baked Chickpea Cutlets

And then, as I was dumping the veg into my stock pot, it hit me that there really was an awful lot of potatoes and carrots and cauliflower and what the heck did I do?…?…? I again consulted the recipe, which was clear and easy to follow, and it hit me like a sack of potatoes, I was following the recipe, but rather than using pounds I was using kilos! So rather than 1lb of cauliflower, I had over 2, and same for the carrots, the potatoes, etc. Silly, silly Shellyfish. No matter, a bit of tweaking with the spices, some additional coconut milk and viola! It wasn’t so much soup anymore, more like Samosa Stuffing sans crust. It was fantastical (yes, my new favourite word) and we had it served over rice, along side the “Chickpea Cutlets” from VCON, and with crispy tofu. A delicious mistake which really helped me out because we had leftovers for a few days, which meant I didn’t need to prepare anything to eat!

Now go make yourself some of that soup! Measure carefully out there, kids!