Curried Black-Bean Sweet-Potato Soup

I found this recipe online just browsing along looking for comfort vegetarian foods. The ingredients sounded awesome and it was a "chilly" day in Hawaii so gave it a go.

With having had meal plans in the University Dining Hall for 4 years, I never gave myself many opportunities to explore cooking much of anything. A chef(y) day for me was making ramen and adding an egg to it, and if I was feeling wild, perhaps a few vegetables. 

Now I look forward to making and trying different nutritious meals. Here is one I will definitely be making (or some variety of) often.

Ingredients: (4 Servings)

(picture features double the ingredients i.e. 8 servings)

(Veg)

1 Sweet Potato (cooked and peeled)

1 Can of Black Beans (drained)

1 Cup of Chopped Onion

2 Cloves of Garlic

Handful of Chopped Cilantro

(Spices)

1 Teaspoon Curry

1 Teaspoon Cayenne Pepper (less for less bite)

1 Teaspoon Ground Ginger Root

1 Teaspoon Cumin

(Other)

1 Can of Light Coconut Milk

1 Cartoon of Vegetable Stock (Can substitute half cartoon and use water as the other half for those trying to limit excess sodium)

Olive Oil

Directions:

Using a tidbit of Olive Oil, cook the Onion/Garlic together until Onions are semi-transparent.

Add in the spices and let them sit for a couple minutes.

Add Beans, Sweet Potato (mashed), spices and cook for a few more minutes.

Add Vegetable Stock, Coconut Milk.

Add Cilantro.

The instructions I followed say to use an immersion blender to make the soup light and creamy but due to not having this, skipped it.

Cook until soup starts to boil and let simmer for 5 minutes.

Sprinkle Cilantro on individual servings for aesthetic appeal (and delicious taste!)

Most important part! Serve with Rice. I am partial to sticky white rice but any rice or something to compliment the soup (such as a bread-bowl) shall work. That's the fun thing about cooking is you can do whatever suits your fancy.

Personally, I like to divide my dish up in sections so rather than stir the rice in with the soup, I partitioned them, but again, whatever suits your fancy.

Reflection:

This was a fun/quick recipe to make and the only thing I would change about the recipe is including chunks of Sweet Potato in the soup along w/ the mashed ones the recipe calls for.

Reflection pt 2.: Putting crunchy peanut inside made it taste so great! After trying these I decided it this combo created one of my favorite foods..

Extra ramble section.

This was an awesome meal and ate quite a hefty amount of it. Probably could have survived without eating the 5+ pieces of bread on top of getting 4ths and 5ths on the soup/rice but hey, it suited my fancy. The problem is, I don't use my brakes or discipline very well when it comes to consuming things I like (in this case, the soup!).

Later on this evening after indulging in this comforting meal, ate 10 (yes 10) of Uncle P's Chocolate Chip Cookies, followed by a bowl of Breyer's Vanilla Ice-cream. I semi-justified the ok-ness of this compulsive eating to running in the woods for 5 hours last night, however, I still got the same guilty feelings after going to far (in this case with eating), again.

I have been weighing myself everyday just to keep track of how my weight has been changing with the decisions I make.

Until next delicious delight! :)