Singapore is the perfect place to be if one was absolutely lazy to cook. One could totally survive entirely on eating out, without even breaking the bank! (We tried, and I even wrote about it here!) That said though, every time I go too long without home-cooked food, I think about all the things I DON’T KNOW I am consuming and feel slightly worried. I mean if I was clogging up my arteries, I wanted to at least know WHAT was clogging them up right?!

As such, I have been trying to prepare at least a third of our meals, so I at least have control of one third of what we consume (Yes, I know that’s still leaving two-thirds to the unknown but “ATTAINABLE” is one part of a SMART goal, okay???)

Cooking at a Sustainable Frequency

Anyhow, while I really enjoy cooking all sorts of stuff including the Laksa from a previous post, I quickly came to realize that it was highly challenging to cook even one meal every single day (while trying to work and study part-time). I know, a long line of (wo)men have probably found this out before me but I am just one of those people who will not listen when told not to touch the hot iron okay?

So some attempts which led to arguments with the Husband later, I started looking out for foods which froze well, and that was NOT how I decided to make Pumpkin Soup.

Here is the real reason I started thinking about making pumpkin soup. When I escape to my favourite One-North hideout Breadyard, one of the things I look forward to was the pumpkin soup. As such, I decided to look it up on my favourite cooking resource: YouTube.

Lo and Behold, I found a Pumpkin Soup video with ONE FREAKING MILLION views. (Yes, I decide which videos to watch first by the number of views, for everything from Pumpkin Soup to Weights in Complex Sample Design.) So I decide to watch it and it seemed quite doable! (The video also seemed very home-made and maybe that also helps make the cooking accessible?)

Recipe and Ingredients

Some time back, I decided to try the recipe out on a small batch of ingredients and enjoyed the result enough to make it again, with some documentation this time!

So the second time around, because I knew that the amount of wash-up was going to be pretty much the same, I went ahead and MADE MORE.

Side Note: I love going to the (wet) market because:

1. There is so much free knowledge. (Don’t know which cut of something to buy? Ask the Uncle. Don’t know if you missed out an ingredient for a dish? Ask the Uncle. But of course don’t ask so much during peak hour lah.)
2. You can get the exact quantity that you need (or like maybe one chilli more if you kiasu).
3. You can bring your own bag and be pretty much zero-waste because the vegetables are not wrapped in plastic.

My wet market of choice is Shunfu Mart.

So this time I went to the market and got the following for this recipe:

1. Two of the above-type pumpkin wedges. (I don’t know what kind of pumpkin)
2. One carrot.
3. One large onion.
4. Some garlic (like maybe 5 cloves or something).

As for the rest of the ingredients which the video called for…

1. Stock: I had some chicken stock at home.
2. Rosemary: Because I am not angmoh and was too lazy to walk seven minutes to my parents’ house (where my brother has rosemary growing) in the sweltering heat, I decided that it was not necessary.
3. Cream: Tried leaving it out the first time and was happy with it so I also decided to leave that out.

Preparing Ingredients

The first time I attempted this recipe was actually the first time I had ever worked with pumpkin. The toughness of the skin did catch me a little by surprise, and ended up trying to peel it with both a knife and peeler. I have since decided on the peeler. If anybody else has any other suggestions, please let me know.

Anyhow, aside from that, the prep is actually fairly straightforward because it was generally coarse chops. Like this:

Next, the carrots…

I remember forgetting the garlic, and so threw the in at the last minute (smashed, skin-removed but without mincing), together with the carrots and onions.

Cooking

In the video, he uses one large pot and a frying pan (and the blender of course). After my first attempt, I decided I would use two pots and forgo the pan.

Here is a brief summary of the cooking:

Boiling the Pumpkin

I use a medium sized pot, bring the water to a boil and throw pumpkin in. The goal is to get them soft, like this:

Preparing Everything Else

In the large pot, I use two tablespoons of cooking oil. (Again, because I am not angmoh, this is actually just your regular Knife brand cooking oil.) When the oil feels sufficiently hot (I don’t think this is that crucial), I throw in the carrots, onions and garlic and let it slowly come up to a friendly sizzle. Once it sizzles, if it starts sounding a bit like an aggressive sizzle, I turn the heat down slightly.

Once the onion starts turning a little translucent, I start adding in the chicken stock (store bought, about 500ml), and let it come up to a boil. Next I return my pumpkin to the pot and let it simmer for another 10 minutes or so.

Blending It All Together

After all of that, all that remains is to blend it all together. For the quantities I used, I had to split the blending into two batches.

Storing

I dish our whatever I feel like having for the day and store the rest in containers such as these handy containers from IKEA:

I have tried refrigerating the soup and having it the next day, as well as freezing them for consumption in the next two weeks. Both have been fine!

Well, I guess that is my first freeze-friendly recipe here, please let me know if anybody else has any other freeze-friendly recipes. Bonus points if they are Asian dishes!

Till next time!