Almond Carrot Soup

Sometimes you are intrigued by the description of a dish in the menu and go for it, like it so much that you want to try making the same. This soup is one such dish that has been keeping me thinking. Once, we were at a restaurant, my nephew and I seemed to fancy the almond soup. It had so much flavour to it from all the garlic and caramelised onions to the otherwise bland soup. We liked it so much that we discussed the soup through the meal.
Few weeks ago, my daughter told me that she was making soup every night to warm herself up as the weather was chill. Everyday she would tell me what soup was their dinner and some of them were quite interesting that it prompted me to try a few. She had made this almond soup with a head of cauliflower. She told me that she used a fistful of almonds and that the soup turned out creamy by itself without any milk.
I had a huge quantity of almonds in the pantry; my husband has this selective dislike for cauliflower, his theory ,manchurian and deep fried golden cauliflower is good while in any other it tastes weird. So putting cauliflower, broccoli and such had to be erased from the soup. Initially I wanted plain almond soup with robust flavours, then wanted to have a vegetable and decided on the carrot. The almonds and the vegetable gave the soup a richness by themselves that the vegan option was a good choice. We did not miss the extra creaminess from addition of milk. I had earlier made the Pane Siciliano for the We Knead to Bake - Bread Baking Group, which paired very well with the soup. It was all we had for our dinner.

Almond Carrot Soup with Garlic and Caramelised Onions

Ingredients:
Serves two people
12 to 15 whole almonds blanched
1 medium carrot cubed
3 teaspoons vegetable oil (any cooking oil would work well)
5 pods of garlic

1 medium red onion sliced finely
Small piece of  ginger (adjusted according to taste)
Salt to taste
Ground black pepper to taste
2 cups of vegetable stock or water

Method:
Soak almonds in hot water, remove the peel. I had blanched almonds readily available and used them.
Soak again in water for about 15 minutes.
Grind the almonds adding sufficient water at intervals to a very smooth paste. Add more water to make a milk like liquid.
Cook the carrot until soft.
Heat 1 teaspoon oil and sauté the garlic pods until they are browned.
Run the garlic, ginger and cooked carrot in a blender and puree them.
Place a pan on the stove, pour the vegetable stock or water in it.
Put in the carrot puree and cook for a few minutes until the raw taste subsides.
Pour in the almond milk and cook on medium heat stirring every now and then to avoid any lumps.
Add the salt and ground black pepper, adjusting according to taste.
Simmer the soup until thickened.

Serve warm with any soup bread.
I am sending this soup to the No Croutons Required Event jointly administered by Lisa and Jacqueline with Lisa hosting the March 2015 edition.