Green pea soup

This post is going to be a short one. There are the Oscars to watch and Sunday chores waiting to be finished as I write this. Has this ever happened to you? You think you have the whole weekend for getting all these things done besides getting some rest and recreation and before you know it, its Sunday evening and you have got your rest and recreation but none of the chores done. It happens to me a lot and as I write this I am mentally jotting down lists of things I have to get to. Phew, next weekend will be different. Hmm that sounds familiar.

Anyways getting to the recipe for the day, its a green pea soup. I originally saw this recipe on Sanjeev Kapoor's website which I was quite delighted to come across. For those of you who are not familiar with Sanjeev Kapoor, he is a celebrity chef in India (very popular and one of the first to have a cooking show on Indian TV). Anyways me and my Mum used to be huge fans of his show and actually wrote his recipes down as he showed them. So I was quite pleased to find his website recently and bookmarked several recipes to try. This green pea soup was one of them. The original recipe called for heavy cream which I substituted with a combination of avocado and yogurt. I also added some white pepper for a little extra spice. It worked quite well in giving the soup the creamy texture originally intended for with the cream. Here goes:

Ingredients:
2 cups fresh or frozen green peas
7 white peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
1/2 teaspoon minced ginger
1 tablespoon butter (I used Smart Balance)
1/2 onion, chopped
1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
2 bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 ripe avocado
2 tablespoons non-fat plain yogurt

- Heat butter in a saucepan and add cumin seeds, white peppercorns and bay leaves. Saute till fragrant.
- Add onion, ginger, garlic and saute till the onion is soft and transparent.
- Add the green peas and salt, followed with 2 cups of water. Cook covered till peas are soft.
- Move the mixture to a blender bowl, add the avocado and yogurt and blend till pureed.
- Add water if required to thin the soup a little, reheat and serve with a little squirt of lemon.

Makes 4 servings.