I might be surrounded by the wilderness just outside of my door, but this dinner cannot technically be considered "Food in the Wild" since I cooked it in the comfort of our warm kitchen. Regardless, sometimes I come across a new dish that I love so much I have to share, this was one of those dishes.
We had an abundance of carrots that needed to be used so I began to search for a carrot soup recipe to accompany the sourdough focaccia that I already had rising by the wood stove. I discovered a recipe for Creamy Chia Coconut Ginger Soup on Epicurious.com that sounded good and found myself following the recipe almost exactly as listed, a rare occurrence when I am in the kitchen. The only change that I made was to reduce the chia seeds added to the simmering soup to 1/8 cup and omit the seeds from the garnish. I actually tasted the soup prior to adding any seeds and loved the flavour and creamy texture, but decided to add a few seeds for the health benefit. After the seeds had rehydrated they thickened the soup slightly, but otherwise were unnoticable in texture. I used a yellow curry and probably added a bit more than called for and I used a chicken stock rather than a vegetable stock as this is what I had on hand.
The soup was amazing! We devoured it all and I am tempted to make more tomorrow, possibly a large batch so I can freeze some as well. The sourdough focaccia was a fantastic accompaniment for the carrot soup and was also gone by the end of the night. Luckily I made two loaves so we could have some with breakfast tomorrow.
My sourdough starter has been with me for a year now, traveling to several locations spending many neglected months in the refrigerator when I was unable to feed or care for it. Luckily my neglect was forgiven and it bubbled right back to life once I started feeding it again. The pungent aroma from the bubbling starter hits my nose as soon as I lift the lid from the liquid and immediately has me craving warm sourdough bread. I followed a recipe for Sourdough Focaccia from Food.com. It was a simple, easy recipe requiring little time other than the time required for rising. The only change I made was to reduce the flour by about 1/2 cup as my starter was already on the thicker side. I garnished one loaf with sea salt and fresh cracked pepper and the other loaf with kalamata olives, feta cheese and basil. The olive loaf was our favorite by far.
I suppose I could adjust both of these recipes to be cooked over an open campfire in a soup pot and a cast iron dutch oven. The soup would be chunky, but I imagine just as tasty and the focaccia should do well in a dutch oven. Sometime I might try this dish "in the wild", but in the meantime I am happy to enjoy it from the warmth of our cabin with views of the snow covered wilderness just outside our windows.
