(electronic dance music) - If you don't make this
soup, you are crazy. It's so simple to prepare. It's absolutely delicious. I know you're gonna love this Now, dependent upon where you're from, you're gonna see many different
variations of this soup, especially when it comes to spices and other vegetables added in there. What I'm going to do is try to provide you with some substitutions
and as many different ways to pull as much flavor
from this as possible. Let's start off a little bit of prep. Sound good? Let's cook. We are going to medium
dice up two yellow onions. You could use red onions, you could use white onions,
or you could use sweet onions. Remove the end, slice it in half, remove that outside peel, and then small to medium-size dice these. It's okay if it's not perfect. Don't sweat it. But don't go far because
we're gonna take these onions in a bowl right over to our cooktop because we want to caramelize them. So we're going to add three
tablespoons of olive oil, you could use ghee or
clarified butter, to this pot. Next, we're gonna turn
the heat onto low-medium and we are gonna add in our onions. We are gonna take the
time to brown these up. Do not skip this portion. This will bring so much flavor
to the soup if you do this. It can take up to 45 minutes for them to be caramelized
brown and have lots of flavor. Now, I have two medium
to large-size carrots that we wanna peel up
and, just like the onions, we want to small to
medium-size dice these. (electronic dance music) Next, I have two ribs of celery that we are also going to
small to medium-size dice. And real quick, why have I always called
these stalks of celery? A stalk is a bunch. What I've always meant is a rib. So two ribs of celery,
small to medium-size dice. For garlic, you already know. I'm gonna run three cloves right through this garlic press. Next, I have one large baking potato. You could substitute out for
two small russet potatoes or three red, new, or
golden Yukon potatoes. Peel those up and then,
again, medium-size dice these. To take care that these do not brown, we're just gonna add them to
a container with cold water. When it comes time to needing them, we'll just drain them off. Set them to the side. Let's go back over to the pot. Let's just have a look at our onions. It's been about 15 minutes or so. Let's give it a quick stir. Starting to become translucent. Not quite brown yet. The flavor is still in the work. Great timing. We have three cups of green lentils. You can also use red,
yellow, or brown lentils, although red and green
seem to be most common at the local grocery store. The one that I would not
recommend are French lentils because they don't break down and it would be really hard to get the right consistency in our soup. Let's head over to our sink. What we wanna do is rinse
these under cold water, maybe just for a minute. Sometimes lentils can be really dirty. So give them a quick rinse, a good shake. We are gonna set them
to the side in a bowl until we need them. Now let's go back over to our prep area. We've got our carrots,
celery, potatoes, and garlic. We're gonna take of these
goodies back over to our cooktop. Let's have another look at our onions. Give them a quick stir. See how they're doing. Absolutely perfect. Browned, tender, so
much goodness in these. Again, I can't say enough
do not skip this part. Now what we're gonna do
is add in our carrots, followed up by adding in our celery, and then, of course, last but not least, let's add in our finely minced garlic. We're gonna turn the
heat up to medium here. These vegetables are a little bit bigger. We want to get a nice light
brown on them, just like this. Perfect. Now, for a little bit of spice, I'm going to add in 1 1/2
teaspoons of ground cumin and one teaspoon of ground coriander. I like adding it at this stage because it sort of gives a little toast while we're sauteing in the vegetables. Also at this stage, if
you want you could deglaze with about 1/2 cup of white wine, chardonnay or sauvignon blanc. Now, let's grab our lentils. Let's pour those in there,
followed up with our potatoes. Yes, I already drained the water off. We are next going to add two bay leaves. You could also add a can of drain chickpeas
right now if you'd like. Next I have nine cups of chicken stock, but if you wanna keep
this vegetarian, vegan, feel free to use water or
simply vegetable stock. Let's give it a quick stir, just to mix all those
ingredients together, get them infusing. We're gonna add a lid. Turn the heat to low to medium. It's gonna take about 45 minutes for these lentils to cook through and to become nice and tender. At that time, we'll come
back and take a peek. Yep, absolutely perfect. Let's just give it a quick stir
and move some things around. Looks excellent. Now, don't forget we want to remove the
bay leaves outta there. You can discard them. No need to keep them. Now I have an immersion blender which we're going to add in there and give a series of pulses. Now, we don't want to
completely break down the soup so it's completely smooth. We want it to have some texture, so the series of pulses
is what you should do. Also, if you don't have this, take half the soup run
it through a blender, get it nice and smooth,
add it back in there. That'll be the perfect
consistency, just like this. Also, in addition, if you wanted to, you could add two cups
of packed baby spinach at this stage for a little green. Now, what we're gonna do is season it well with salt and fresh-cracked black pepper. Remember season once, taste twice. Taste it. Season it. Taste it again. See if it needs anymore. And now for some much-needed acid, we are gonna squeeze
the juice of one lemon. Sometimes I like to put
my other hand under there, just to catch any seeds just like this from falling in there. Give it a quick shake. Absolutely perfect. And, of course, you want to
give this a stir one more time to obviously incorporate the
salt, pepper, and lemon juice. The soup looks excellent. It tastes great. It smells amazing. Now we need to plate this
up in just a few minutes. And it is always all about these fundamental
cooking techniques, putting them into practice
over and over again. It will absolutely help
elevate your everyday cooking. Taking the time to caramelize the onions. There's so much flavor
in the base of that. Incorporating spices. Rinsing your lentils. Doing all of these things will absolutely make the
food so dang delicious. Super easy to plate it up. Here's how you do it. Of course, add this to a nice large bowl and there are several options
you can use for garnish. You can add some more herbs on there, like thyme, like cilantro,
chervil, parsley. You could even do a little bit of feta cheese if you wanted to. For me, I like to simply keep
it fresh chopped parsley. Can't wait to get in this. (electronic dance music)
