Category:
Soups & Stews

Collards and Lentils

Ingredients:

lentils
collards
salt
garlic
ginger root
capsicum
cumin
coriander seed
cinnamon
blackstrap molasses
wine
parsnip
sweet potato

Pick through, rinse, and cook several handfuls of good lentils in four or five times their volume of unsalted water until they are quite soft. An hour will do for most varieties.

Wash a small bunch of collards* and separate the leaves from the thicker stems. Chop the stems and add them to a liter of boiling water.

After ten minutes, add the chopped leaves. Add three cloves of garlic, a couple of slices of ginger root, and a Scotch Bonnet or other strong capsicum (pepper,) all finely minced. Add a large pinch of ground cumin, the same of ground coriander seed, and a lesser pinch of ground cinnamon. Add a dollop of blackstrap molasses and half a glass of wine.
Cook for ten more minutes.

Add the lentils and all their liquid. Use boiling water to adjust the consistency if necessary. Add half a teaspoon of salt. Bring back to a simmer, and add a parsnip, sliced. Five minutes later add a sweet potato, peeled and sliced. Adjust the seasoning, and serve over hand-cut noodles when the sweet potato is done.

Notes:

*Young and tender inner leaves of collard greens will of course cook much faster than the thick and sometimes coarse outer ones. If you buy a bunch made up of more than one stalk, break off and use all the outermost leaves, all more or less of a size, at one go if you can. The remainder store well, chilled, if left attached. The central stalk itself is very fibrous and will be at its best in the compost heap.

Recipe Index

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 Roast Garlic Soup  | Mosaic Soup | Bitter Chiffonade |  Bamboo Stew | Barley and Lentil Cottage Pottage | Carrot and Ginger Soup | Souped Up |