Coconut Curry Pumpkin Soup

While we were cooking Thanksgiving dinner, I looked through my Joy of Cooking, I noticed a recipe for pumpkin soup that didn't require an actual whole squash (which we didn't have at home). I suddenly had the impulse to make pumpkin soup. We didn't have any squash at home, but luckily we did have a can of pumpkin in the cupboard. I ended up, making up a soup of my own, instead of following the recipe (since I really wanted curried pumpkin soup), but the cookbook was a great source of inspiration. After debating to use chicken stock, skim milk, or coconut milk as the base, I finally decided on coconut milk since I thought skim milk would be too thin, chicken stock too plain, and there seemed to be a few other curry-coconut-pumpkin soups on the Internet, so I figured that the combination would work. The soup was nice, but next time I'd like to try it with a roasted butternut or kabocha squash (e.g. http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/001525.html"). I tried the soup thicker and thinner, and I preferred the thinner version, especially with rye crackers.

1 can pumpkin canned pumpkin
1/2 can light coconut milk, shake can to mix contents before opening
a spoonful or two of curry powder
a few slices of ginger
1 carrot, sliced into small pieces
1 celery stalk, sliced into small pieces
1/2 onion, minced
salt

Saute onions until they have caramelised. Add celery, carrots, and ginger and saute for about 5 minutes, or until they have softened.

Add a spoonful or two of curry powder and saute for about 30 seconds until it is fragrant and smoking but not burnt. Add a bit of small portion of the coconut milk to stop the curry from toasting. Add the pumpkin to the pot, and mix well. Add the remaining coconut milk, and dilute the soup with water, if necessary.

Bring the soup to a boil, reduce heat to low, and loosely cover. Simmer the soup for about 30 minutes.

Turn off the heat after the soup has simmered for a while, and let the soup cool a bit. Try to remove most of the ginger slices; leave 1 ginger slice in the soup if you like your soup to be gingery. Blend until smooth with an immersion blender. If any ginger slices remain, then be sure to blend them well.

Heat soup until just boiling. Taste. Adjust the consistency, if necessary, by adding more water, until the soup is as thick or thin as you like. Add salt to taste (you probably need to add a few pinches of salt to fully bring out the flavor).