This soup is perfect for the fall season. Warm, comforting and a little spicy but not too spicy. Top it with crunchy pumpkin seeds and it makes a perfect light lunch or appetizer. Enjoy!
Food Babe's Thai Spiced Pumpkin Soup
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
Serves: 4
Ingredients
- 2 teaspoons coconut oil
- 1 yellow onion, diced
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 cups pumpkin, peeled and small dice (or 1 BPA free-can or container of pumpkin puree)
- 2 cups vegetable broth, more as needed
- 2 cups of coconut milk
- 1 bay leaf
- ¼ teaspoon dried thyme
- 2 tablespoons red curry paste
- ½ teaspoon nutmeg
- sea salt and pepper, to taste
- 4 tablespoons pumpkin seeds (pepitos)
- 4 tablespoons fresh cilantro
Instructions
- In a pot, heat coconut oil over medium heat. Add the onions, garlic and pumpkin and cook 4-5 minutes.
- Add the stock, coconut milk, bay leaf, thyme and curry paste and cook for 15-20 minutes, adding more stock as needed.
- Take off the heat, remove the bay leaf and puree with an immersion blender or regular blender.
- Place back on the stove and add the nutmeg and season with salt and pepper as desired. Heat until warmed through.
- To serve, place the soup in a bowl and top with the pumpkin seeds and chopped cilantro. Enjoy!
Notes
***Please choose all organic ingredients if possible***
If you know someone who loves pumpkin, please share this recipe with them! Who knows, maybe they will invite you over for some of this soup.
Xo,
Vani
P.S. This recipe is from this month’s Food Babe Eating Guide Program. If you are tired of figuring out what to eat, sick of the confusing choices at the grocery store and need help menu planning, let us assist you! Check out the program here.
what is red curry paste?
You can find it the asian section of most grocery stores – it comes in a glass jar. Hope that helps!
Thank you, Vani. Can you please give me the brand name of the red curry paste that you used? It will be easier to look for it in the Asian store. Thanks so much.
Thai kitchen makes one that is easy to find. Hope that helps!
thank you, Vani.
I’m on the Anti-Inflammatory Lifestyle, and need to avoid Nightshades: all peppers, colored, hot, black, whatever, are dangerous for me. Do you have any substitute for the food qualities that colored peppers bring to cooking, especially one-pot main dishes? I recall that most curry pastes have MSG in them; are they also a hot spice that is unacceptable for AI lifestyle people? Thanks for your help. From Seattle, home of Starbuck’s, but there are a few of us who don’t partake………… AJ
Ginger POWDER tastes peppery to me. Each form of ginger has a different taste. Pineapple, including canned, will pick up the ginger taste and be like ginger candy. I like to do this in rice.
Hi vani how do u feel about bee pollen
You can find this at Whole Foods. You don’t have to go to an Asian Market for most things. Great recipe. Made it for dinner tonight.
MJ
What are the calories and nutritional values? Are they calories and nutrition listed on your Eating Guide Program?
Anita – We don’t list calories or nutrition on the program because it based on whole food ingredients. Each day is estimated between 1400-1600 calories with the option of adding snacks or more portions depending upon your body weight and weight loss or maintenance goals. I have a team that can answer any of your questions M-F as you go through the program if you need additional assistance.
This looks really good. Going to try it this week.
Ooo…this sounds so good! I do miss reading an entertaining anecdote with the recipe this time though :-/ Thanks for sharing your recipe!
Haha – next time I won’t let you down 🙂
How do you know if a container is BPA-free (like for the pumpkin)? Are non-BPA containers labeled as such? Love your posts!
Yes – it should be labeled or you can get some in a tetra-pak (non-canned) version.
I thought the tetra-pals have either some form of BPA or something else in the lining that is an endocrine disruptor?
Aren’t Tetra-Paks lined with aluminium?
I’m totally doing this recipe, but I like to roast my own pumpkin meat for soups. This is an easy and BEYOND fresh way to do pumpkin and skip the cans altogether. PS: Any pumpkin will do, but “pie” varieties tend to have more meat. I’ve used “Cinderella” pumpkins for soups and they’re AWESOME!
Hi Samantha,
How do you roast your own pumpkin? I’ve roasted butternut squash, but never have done anything with a pumpkin other than carve it 🙂
Thanks for any detailed instructions you can give,
Cindy
Cindy: Preheat oven to 385. Pare and de-seed pumpkin; cut into 2″ chunks. Toss in olive oil. Roast in shallow casserole dish for about 35-40 minutes. Volia!
PS: You can throw in the yellow onion when you do this. but NOT diced, rather in quarters (larger chunks won’t burn). Both will caramelize. EPIC
It’s much easier this way: http://localfoods.about.com/od/wintersquashpumpkin/tp/How-To-Roast-Pumpkin.htm
Melanie S.: That is an easy way to get the pumpkin softened and easy to scoop, however I do it this way because I love the browned pits on the pumpkin chunks and the onions and it adds a “smokiness” to the soup that I prefer. That being said, I also pared and cut up two other pumpkins and froze the chunks for future use. Yesterday, I took a gallon sized bag of pumpkin chunks out of the freezer and put it in a soup pot with a carton of chicken broth, one cut up onion, and four pared and cut carrots. I added curry powder, chile powder, garlic salt, pepper, and lots of dried basil. It all simmered for about a half an hour. I liquified that, and bingo! Quite good.
oh my gosh,
Soup , on the picture makes me to cook in my kitchen.
actually, i like corn soup, but your recommended receipe always helpful of my body.
So, this weekend morning i’ll make this pumpkin soup
Thank you for your receipe posting~~^^
My fam LOVES some pumpkin soup! I’m going to make this one tonight! I’ve never tried using curry in mine. I usually add organic beef broth and a touch of REAL, organic maple syrup. That’s pretty yummy too.
ahhh this sounds wonderful! I love soups like this, and I love the thai twist too. I bought a thai curry paste back from england last time I was there, and I still have some left, this would be a great way to use it. My body can use all the health it can get after I run the marathon this weekend, but hopefully it will be worth it if I get that qualifier!
when you say coconut milk are you talking about the canned kind or the carton kind?
Im pretty sure it is canned that she is talking about.
I made mine with the unsweetened carton kind because that is what I had in the house and it was delicious.
Hi Food Babe! I LOVE the taste/versatility of coconut milk, but stopped buying it because I have never been able to find a brand that doesn’t include Guar gum as an ingredient. Is there a brand that exists which omits this ingredient? What is your take on this ingredient (level of harm to the body)? Which brand do you use?
you could make your own lori that’s what i normally do because i don’t like all he extra stuff in the cans at the store http://wellnessmama.com/2447/homemade-coconut-milk/
Thank you Alexis! I had never considered making coconut milk from the dried shreds! I’m totally going to do this!
“Natural Value” canned coconut milk is the only brand I know that doesn’t have guar gum or anything else added AND is in BPA-free cans. Native Forest’s coconut milk is also in BPA-free cans but has the guar gum added.
Hi, Lori, Natural Value brand has no guar gum. (I’ve gotten it on Amazon before…)
Vani–I have the same question that Holly posted. Is the coconut milk the thick kind that comes in a can or the thin kind that comes in a box and can be poured on cereal, etc? Do you have a brand you recommend? Thanks!
Hi! I have green curry paste on hand. Can I use it instead of buying red? Thanks!
Nice recipe! You need to put a cookbook together. . . I mean what better cookbook than from the Food Babe.
Do you puree the bay leave or would you recommend taking it out ?
The recipe sound awesome!! Can’t wait to try it.
YES! please remove the bay leaf first.
Really dumb question here. When do I had the vegetable broth? So before you rag on me, I’m not a cook so I need step by step instructions.
Step 2 where it says add stock
Stock and Broth are the same thing? I told you I wasn’t a cook. At least I’m trying.
Love, love, love pumpkin!
Have made a version of this but not with curry , anxious to try with curry.
I must say some of the comments are mind blowing – sorry you have some real idiots wasting comment space. Thanks for all that you do!!!
As teachers are always saying, there is no such thing as a dumb question. New cooks might try to find an older (1960s or 1970s) Joy of Cooking. It is the Bible of cooking and gives basic procedures. Cooking has basic procedures used in all recipes.
sound Yummy,Going To Give It A Try,Thanx For All You Do Vani.
Vani, Is it the canned coconut milk thick and creamy or the liquid boxed kind like so?
Yummy sounds delicious!
This soup is amazing. I added some cooked Mung beans to it as well. Yum!!!
Thank you for sharing this recipe.
I really REALLY don’t like coconut milk. Would almond milk work? Any other suggestions. I’m lactose intolerant but I’m not vegan.
Coconut milk and the listed spices make the Thai flavor. If you use water or home made broth with cumin, cilantro you will get Central American flavor where they use a lot of squash. Squash is used all over the world with the spice determining the local flavor.
why dont you have a printable version of this soup???
i dont feel like wasting 6 pages of ink and paper for one recipe
you are supposed to care about those things.. right?
ps i still luv ya
Do what I do most of the time so I don’t get a lot of unwanted ‘extras’. Copy/paste the recipe on a notepad and print it from that. 🙂
PS – As I scrolled back up; again I noticed there IS a Print button underneath the photo.
PS – As I scrolled back up again, I noticed there IS a Print button underneath the photo.
This is the 3rd time I’ve tried posting as it doesn’t seem to work, so hope this doesn’t show up three times.
just write it down, won’t take long or take up space.
Made it after work today (7 Oct). Left out the onions & cilantro (I had bought all the ingredients but forgot the cilantro. Didn’t want to go back out. Also, I hate onions, so I left that out). It actually was delicious and I had two helpings. Please keep posting more awesome recipes like this. I’m grateful!
Can NOT wait to try this!! It’s like all of my favorite things. Thank you!! 🙂
Perfect, we always make pumpkin soup for our family’s annual pumpkin carving party and I am simultaneously doing an elimination diet due to joint pain that has me skipping dairy, so I was wondering about subbing coconut milk and then WHAM your recipe him my inbox. Thanks for the timely post, Vani!
This recipe is divine! I just sat down with a bowl. 🙂
I added fresh chopped ginger and lemongrass, a few keffir lime leaves and chia seeds. I’ll probably overdose on this during pumpkin season. 😉
Making the soup right now. Must use the can coconut milk which is much thicker
as I am going to add more pumpkin to thicken my soup up. I see that several people have asked what coconut milk to use and you have not answered. Some constructive criticism ……for future recipe sharing…….please be more specific.
Thanks!
Best soup ever. Just made it mmmmmmmmmmmm
Just WOW! It was sooo delicious!!! The taste was so complex and harmonious! It was the first thai soup i’ve ever made and it turned out great! I’d reduce red paste to 1 tbsp next time, but this is personal choise so 5 stars from me! ***** Katia, UK
This sounds yummy. You you know the nutritional values? Carbs, fat, protein, etc?
Do you mean Thai leaf when you write Bay leaf in the ingredients, because thai soups specialty is with the thai leaf – can you enlighten me kindly. This must be pretty sweety and thick, i would be loving the thickness of it but do you recommend anything to reduce the sweetness from the pumpkin?
Can you substitute butternut squash for the pumpkin
We just did some quick math and looks like around 1,800-2,000 calories in the entire batch of soup. We feel like you can get more than 4 servings out of the batch, and plan to share between 6 making it around 300 calories per serving.
I totally agree. Make this for 6 instead of 4.
Made this tonight, so yummy – thanks!
In spanish please
Hi Vani!
Can this be cooked via crock pot? 🙂 thank you!
I just made the soup and I love it!! It’s so filling and full of flavor. I roasted my own pumpkin for the first time and I was surprised at how easy it it. Fresh cilantro and roasted pumpkin seeds really bring out the flavors. Will definitely make again!
Just made this soup according to your recipe and found it tasty but very intense! I cook and eat Thai food all the time, I don’t have a mild palate. I think the curry, garlic and onion overpower the pumpkin. I added more pumpkin, sugar and cinnamon and liked it better. I will make the following changes next time:
1 tbsp. of red curry; taste before adding more
1/2 onion
2 garlic cloves
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
Thanks, Food Babe for your research, recipes and activism!
See and I found it too mild… Wondering where I went wrong…
This looks delicious but I’m having a hard time seeing what is “healthy” about this soup – the pumpkin? (Healthy like pumpkin bread?) Coconut milk packs an eye-opening 445 calories and 48 grams of fat (43 grams saturated) per cup.
Hi Dee,
I hope this helps you: saturated fats are actually the GOOD fats (your brain, being mostly fat, needs it!); trans-fats are the real demons. Check out this article on saturated fats: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/12/28/what-you-dont-know-about-fats.aspx
And even Weight Watchers admits that counting calories does not work (source: https://www.bulletproofexec.com/the-one-big-mistake-weight-watchers-made-for-14-years-time-magazine/).
What matters most in maintaining a healthy diet is eating quality, real food (not processed) that’s not genetically modified or coated with chemicals that are toxic to our bodies. I hope this helps answer your question! Happy cooking!
I made this soup this week-end and it was DELICIOUS! I made a few changes though (I can never follow a recipe by the book…). For soup lovers out there, I suggest you roast the pumpkin in the oven before boiling it with the other ingredients. I also added two garlic cloves and half a red pepper in the oven to roast. No oil, no water. Just the veggies. I also added in the frying pot the pumpkin seeds and some walnuts together with 2 cloves of garlic and 1 RED onion, and also half of a fresh tomato, chopped, thyme, salt and fresh pepper. I fried them lightly in Thai flavored oil. At the end, I added fresh basil. It was absolutely delicious!!!
I too roasted my pumpkin in the oven first but I found the flavor of this soup just a little lacking… What did I do wrong? I ended up adding the whole can of coconut milk just for more flavor -but it was still super mild… Maybe adding more red curry paste would do the trick? Still yummy though – having leftovers for lunch today!
I made this soup the other night and thought it was delicious! Perfect Coconut, pumpkin, curry combination I was craving!
It is so refreshing to find a healthy recipe online that consists of ingredients I already have in my house!!! Love it. Really excited to try this out. Perfect for Fall.
Just made this for lunch today! When I tasted it, though, it seemed to be missing something. Had the salty, had the spicy, AH! The sweet! A couple tablespoons of maple syrup did the trick. Uh-mazing. You’ve got to try it like this!
Made this with Kabocha, it was delishious.
This is fantastic. Made it tonight with butternut squash instead of pumpkin because I prefer squash. Other minor tweaks: for some heat, I added red pepper flakes. I used lightly toasted sunflower seeds instead of Pepita’s. Thanks for a great recipe!
WOW! I made this soup sans the lentils and it was PHENOMENAL! Just not a fan of lentils but oh is it good even without them!!! The house smelled amazing and the soup was fantastic.
Thanks for sharing Laurie. Glad that you liked it!
The red Thai curry paste we have at our Thai market is extremely spicy. I only used one tbspn and it was still too spicy. I found another recipe th hat suggested adding white beans and puree it up. I think I’ll do that next time. Thanks for the recipe.
Made this today – very good – I thought just needed a bit more kick, so I added crushed red pepper. Perfect autumn soup 🙂 and very easy to make
I’d love to get the nutrition info, please 🙂