Blended red lentil and carrot soup finished with a drizzle of chilli and dried mint butter. Costs pennies, and this version uses rice rather than flour to thicken.
Prep
10 mins
Cook
35 mins
Servings
6
Per serving
£0.43
Difficulty
easy
Mercimek corbasi is on every menu in Turkey and in most homes weekly. Many versions thicken it with a spoonful of flour, which is unnecessary and would rule it out for coeliacs. Red lentils and a handful of rice do the job better anyway, and the mint butter poured over at the end is what makes it memorable.
Heat the olive oil in a large pan and cook the onions and carrots over a medium heat for 10 minutes until softened and just starting to colour.
Stir in the tomato purée and cumin and cook for 1 minute.
Add the rinsed lentils, the rice, the diced potato, 1.5 tsp of the salt and 1.6 litres of water. Bring to the boil, skimming off any foam.
Simmer, part-covered, for 25 minutes until the lentils have completely dissolved and the potato falls apart under a spoon.
The rice is doing the job flour normally does here, so let it cook long enough to break down. Underdone rice leaves a gritty soup.
Blend until completely smooth, either with a stick blender in the pan or in batches in a jug blender. Add hot water if it is thicker than you want.
Return to a low heat, taste and add the remaining salt as needed. Keep it warm.
Melt the butter in a small pan over a low heat. As soon as it foams, take it off the heat and stir in the dried mint and pul biber. It will sizzle and turn deep red.
Ladle the soup into bowls, drizzle the mint butter over each one in a spiral, and serve with lemon wedges to squeeze in at the table.