Curried Cucumber Soup with Black Quinoa

This chilled curried cucumber soup looks fancy, but it’s incredibly easy to prepare. The sweet curry and black quinoa offer a delicate blend of pleasing flavors and textures.

I adapted the recipe from an article in the June 2015 edition of Vegetarian Times magazine. I replaced yogurt and sour cream with vegan options to make it entirely plant-based. And I tweaked a few other details to simplify preparation. The results are extremely satisfying.

Curried Cucumber Soup

You can prepare this curried cucumber soup in about ten minutes. But then you need to chill it for at least two hours. The quinoa adds additional prep time if you don’t cook it in advance. Here’s the timeline:

• Rinse and cook quinoa (about 15 minutes)
• Prep and blend soup ingredients while quinoa is cooking (about 10 minutes)
• Chill soup (about 2 hours)
• Combine black quinoa mixture while soup is cooling (about 5 minutes)

Basically, you want to prepare the soup at least 2 hours before serving.

📖 Recipe

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Curried Cucumber Soup with Black Quinoa

Prep Time 2 hours hours 15 minutes minutes

Total Time 2 hours hours 15 minutes minutes

Servings 2 -4

Author Veggie Primer

Ingredients

Quinoa

• 1 cup cooked black quinoa*
• 1 Tbs. fresh mint chopped
• 1 Tbs. fresh parsley chopped
• 1 tsp. fresh lemon juice
• ½ tsp. lemon zest

Soup

• 2 English cucumbers peeled, seeded and coarsely chopped
• ½ cup plant-based plain Greek-style yogurt I use Tempt Hemp
• ½ cup raw cashews soaked in hot water for 30 minutes and drained
• 1 clove garlic
• 3 Tbs. water
• 3 Tbs. fresh mint chopped
• 3 Tbs. fresh parsley chopped
• ½ Tbs apple cider vinegar
• 2 tsp. lemon juice
• 1-2 tsp. sweet curry powder to taste
• ½ tsp. lemon zest
• ⅛ tsp. ground ginger
• ⅛ tsp. fine sea salt

Instructions

Quinoa

• Combine cooked quinoa (see notes below), mint, parsley, lemon juice, and lemon zest in a small mixing bowl and set aside.

Soup

• Add all soup ingredients (cucumbers, yogurt, cashews, garlic, water, mint, parsley, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, sweet curry powder, lemon zest, ground ginger and sea salt) to a high-speed blender.
• Begin blending and the lowest setting and slowly turn up to the highest setting.
• Blend on high for approximately 40 seconds or until smooth. (Use tamper if necessary.)
• Refrigerate for at least 2 hours then pour soup into 2 - 4 bowls. Top each bowl with ¼ - ½ cup of the black quinoa mixture and serve.

Notes

*For fluffy quinoa, bring 2 parts water and 1 part quinoa to a boil and cook on medium-low for about 10 minutes or until seeds begin to release “tails.” Then drain any remaining water, replace lid and allow to sit on the warm stove for at least 5 minutes.

Be sure to rinse quinoa before cooking unless you purchase pre-rinsed.

You can use any variety of quinoa - black just looks pretty in this recipe.

The yield is about 4 cups of soup.

 Note: I do not include nutrition information with my recipes because I subscribe to the theories presented in the book Whole and believe we should focus on eating a variety of whole foods instead of counting calories or keeping track of individual nutrients.