Mark Bittman's Creamy Spinach Soup (Made Vegan) for Souper (Soup, Salad, & Sammie) Sundays

There are weeks when you want to fuss over a pot of soup and there are weeks when you want something creamy and delicious, but you want it quickly. That's where Mark Bittman comes in. I have made a few of his "customizable soups" from this 2011 New York Times article and they are always easy and tasty. 

I had a big container of organic baby spinach that I have not been using as quickly as I should so I decided to make this Creamy Spinach Soup, which gets its creaminess and a nice tangy flavor from Greek yogurt. Because I limit my dairy for my asthma and allergies, I replaced the yogurt with some simple cashew creme, adding lemon juice to give it some tang. My changes to his recipe sketch are in red below.  

Creamy Spinach Soup
Adapted from Mark Bittman's via The New York Times
(Serves 4)

Put 1 chopped onion, 2 peeled garlic cloves, 3 cups water (I used light veggie broth) and salt and pepper in a pot over high heat. Boil, cover, lower the heat and simmer until the onion is tender, about 10 minutes. 

Add 10 ounces chopped spinach and 1/2 cup parsley leaves; cook until the spinach is tender, 2 to 3 minutes. Add 1 cup Greek-style yogurt (I used cashew creme with 1 tbsp lemon juice) and purée. Garnish: A spoonful of Greek-style yogurt (I used cashew creme) and chopped parsley.

Notes/Results:  Great flavor for just a few ingredients and a short amount of time. The brightness from the yogurt or in this case, cashew creme and lemon juice keep it from being too 'green' and spinachy and make it delicious. If you aren't interested in making this soup dairy/free or vegan and have yogurt, go ahead and use it, or if you didn't want to use cashew cream, add a plain non-dairy yogurt or sour cream. It's a flexible recipe. This is a great 'dipping soup'--I brushed a couple of thick pieces of French bread with olive oil and toasted them so they were crispy on the outside, soft inside. Perfect! It would also be great with a grilled cheese. I would happily make it again. 
 

I am linking this soup up at I Heart Cooking Clubs for Potluck week--our chance to make any recipe from our current or previous IHCC chefs. You can see what everyone made by checking out the picture links on the post.
 

We have some good friends in the Souper Sundays kitchen who shared some delicious dishes last week--let's have a look! 

Simona of briciole made this Slow-Roasted Heirloom Tomato Gazpacho for the Soup Swap Party Event and says, "The book arrived in time for me to make several batches of the gazpacho to adjust the recipe to my liking. In particular, I used shallot (scalogno) from my garden, roasted the pepper (peperone) and used my favorite varieties of cucumber (cetriolo). I also halved the amount of tomatoes, since I never made the recipe for a party."

Vicki of I'd Rather Be At The Beach made this Ham, Turkey, & Sharp Cheddar Panini and said, "I enjoy a good Panini once in a while, and this is a good one for when you don’t have a tomato or avocado on hand. I definitely would have added them if I’d had some, but this was still a yummy Panini. Sometimes it’s good to go simple."

Tina of Squirrel Head Manor made a hearty veggie rice skillet dinner and used the leftovers in these Pita Pockets with Rice and Veggies. She said, "There was enough for two main meals and one lunch. For our lunch we used whole wheat pitas stuffing them with fresh spinach, chopped tomato and the remainder of the rice skillet. Paired up with a yogurt and that was a satisfying lunch."
 

A big thank you to everyone who joined in this week!

Souper Sundays is back with a new format of a picture link each week where anyone interested can post their soups, salads, or sandwiches any time during the week and I post a recap of the entries the following week.)

(If you aren't familiar with Souper Sundays, you can read about of the origins of it here. 

If you would like to join in Souper (Soup, Salad, and Sammie) Sundays, I would love to have you! Here's how...

To join in this week's linkup with your soup, salad or sandwich:

• Link up your soup (stew, chili, soupy curries, etc. are fine), salad, or sandwich dish, (preferably one from the current week or month--but we'll take older posts too) on the picture link below and leave a comment on this post so I am sure not to miss you.

On your entry post (on your blog):

• please mention Souper (Soup, Salad & Sammies) Sundays at Kahakai Kitchen and link back to this post.
• you are welcome to add the wonderful Souper Sundays logo (created by Ivy at Kopiaste) to your post and/or blog (optional).

An InLinkz Link-up

Have a happy, healthy week!