Raw vegan miso soup, with zucchini and pumpkin noodles

As winter time approaches here in New Zealand I’ve been thinking about a strategy for stay raw throughout the winter. I know from past experience that while it’s easy and quite natural for me to eat raw during warm weather, when it starts getting cold it’s harder for me to stay raw naturally, and I especially love soups in the winter months.

Today I think I found a solution, and I’d just like to take a moment to express my gratitude for miso. I have loved miso since I first tasted it. But to make things even better, it’s a fermented food. Which means that even though the ingredients are cooked (and not raw), the fermentation process turns it back into a living food, full of enzymes and friendly bacteria that help to promote healthy digestion.

Simply dissolving a spoonful of miso paste into a cup of warm water makes a delicious, nourishing broth. And from there you can add whatever vegetables you like and have on hand.

Miso comes in many varieties, all with different flavors, depending on the base ingredient used to make it. The one I use most is the sweet brown rice miso, I find it’s the most versatile. But I also love the brown rice miso in soups. For stronger flavor, try the barley or soy bean miso. Just be careful to choose a miso that’s made with non-GM foods, and one that’s raw and unpasteurized.

The pasteurizing process was developed to kill any bacteria, so pasteurizing any fermented food, like apple cider vinegar, yogurt, miso, sauerkraut, kills all the beneficial bacteria – totally defeating the whole purpose of fermenting the food in the first place. It seems totally ridiculous to me that anyone would even consider doing it, but we’ve strayed so far from nature and what’s natural that we do ridiculous and counter-productive things like this all the time. We’ve become so paranoid about bacteria that we’ve forgotten that without these amazing little creatures, the world as we know it would not exist.

The trick to miso soup is to never boil the miso. If you boil the miso you’ll kill the friendly bacteria and enzymes.  Always boil or warm the water, wait for it to cool down a bit and then add it to the miso. To qualify as a raw food you want to make sure you don’t heat it above 110-118 degrees F (43-47 degrees C), because above that temperature you start destroying the nutrients and enzymes of the food.

So with all that said, let’s get onto the business of making raw vegan miso soup with zucchini and pumpkin noodles. The easiest way is to prepare the vegetables and divide them into a bowl for each serving you need. Warm up enough water to fill the number of bowls you are preparing.

Ingredients:

1-2 tbsp of white miso paste
handful of dried, shiitake mushrooms, sliced
handful of wakame seaweed flakes (or other seaweed of your choice)
fresh vegetables (zucchini, capsicum/bell pepper, green or red chili pepper, cabbage, spinach, etc), sliced thinly
handful of mung bean sprouts
zucchini and/or pumpkin for ‘noodles’ (or any other squash you like)
water

Instructions:

Put the water on the stove to start warming up, and while you’re waiting for it add the seaweed and shiitake to each of the bowls. Break up the shiitake into smaller pieces so they will soften more quickly. Start slicing the remaining vegetables, except for the zucchini and pumpkin to be used as noodles.  When the water is warm enough, add enough to the bowls to cover the seaweed and dried shiitake and allow them to soak and soften while you continue to prepare the rest of the vegetables.

If you’re using any vegetables, like cabbage that are a bit crunchy you might want to add them to a separate mixing bowl, add a little sea salt and massage and squeeze them until they are more tender. In my soup I added some red cabbage kim chi that I made yesterday, so it wasn’t fully fermented and sour, but very tender, similar to the effect that you get from cooking.

To prepare the ‘noodles’, cut open the pumpkin or squash and, using a spoon, remove the seeds and any mushy pulp that was around the seeds by scraping them out with the spoon. Zucchini can be cut in half lengthwise. Use a vegetable peeler to make long strips from the zucchini and pumpkin. Try to make the strips as wide as possible.

Zucchini and Pumpkin Noodles

Lay the strips out on a cutting board and stack about 4-5 strips on top of each other. Then starting at one of the short ends roll the strips up. Use a sharp knife to cut across the roll of strips in whatever thickness you prefer. I felt like linguini, so I cut my strips as narrow as I could.

Zucchini and Pumpkin Noodles

For each bowl, dissolve 1-2 tbsp of miso paste in some warm water by putting it in a cup, adding the water and mixing with a spoon or fork until dissolved. Pour the miso into the bowl. Do this for each bowl in turn. Divide the remaining sliced vegetables and noodles to the bowls and top up with the warm water and stir. Serve and enjoy!

The finished miso vegetable soup with zucchini and pumpkin noodles

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Raw Garden Vegetable Soup

Since I haven’t gotten around to making any raw soups yet, I thought I’d go in search of a video recipe, and I found a good one. Garden Vegetable Soup, by Jennifer Cornbleet. It looks and sounds delicious. I actually have enough of the ingredients to try one myself tomorrow. They are not so different than a green smoothie, except in the seasonings. Jennifer talks about the 6 basic components of a raw soup in the video, I love the way she breaks it down so simply, it gives me a much better foundation to work from when I create my own. I’m really good at creating delicious cooked soups, but raw soups seemed a bit daunting. Not any more

So here’s a rough transcript of the video, which is further down the page:

Garden Vegetable Soups are a great way to get more greens and vegetables in your diet. Lots of great soup recipes in her book, Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People .

There’s 6 basic components that go into any great tasting blended raw vegetable soup

1. Some kind of watery vegetables and/or greens. For example tomato, zucchini, celery, spinach, red bell pepper, Romaine lettuce, chard, kale. Try not to mix together too much red and green or the color won’t be so great. One tomato in an otherwise green soup will be fine, but try to keep it either mostly red or green.
2. Water to thin out the soup a little bit.
3. Some kind of citrus juice, lemon, lime or orange to perk up the flavor.
4. Salty seasoning. Natural sea salt or miso (fermented soybean paste) gives it a nice deep flavor similar to what you would get from vegetable stock or bouillon.
5. Pungent seasonings such as fresh herbs and spices, garlic, onion, a bit of curry powder.
6. Some kind of fat to make the soup creamy. You can use avocado, olive oil or soaked nuts and seeds.

Instructions:

Use a blender to get a nice creamy consistency.

Coarsely chop zucchini (no need to peel it because you get a lot of nutrients in the peel), chop celery. Cut a tomato roughly, no need to remove the seeds since it’s a blended soup. Add some spinach, Swiss chard or kale. Add basil (pungent herb), use quite a bit so it’s both a pungent flavor and another green. Add some water (looks like about 2 cups).

Seasonings: lemon juice, natural sea salt and miso (mellow white miso) – about a tablespoon. Pungent seasonings: crushed garlic, green onions, a little bit of cayenne pepper.

Blend all the ingredients and add the fat (avocado) afterward. Blend until the soup has liquefied.

Cut avocado in half, twist to separate. Scoop half the avocado right into the blender. You can remove the avocado stone by pressing your knife into it just a bit and twisting the avocado while holding the blade of the knife still.

Blend again, just enough to blend the avocado in. If you over-blend avocados it can ruin the flavor and color.

You can serve in a bowl, or put it into a jar with a tight-fitting lid to take with you.

Raw food author and chef Jennifer Cornbleet shows you how to quickly make a delicious raw Garden Vegetable Soup. From her DVD, Raw Food Made Easy .
Raw Food Made Easy For 1 or 2 People

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Slow Cooker Lentil Quinoa Stew

This hearty lentil stew is an easy to cook, high protein meal that suits those on low carb diets – such as the South Beach diet and low GI diets. Both lentils and quinoa are high in fiber and protein.

Ingredients:

2 cups brown lentils
1/2 cup quinoa
7-1/2 cups water
1-2 medium potatoes, diced
1/2 small sweet potato, diced
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teas wheat-free tamari (or soy sauce if you aren’t on a wheat-free diet)
2 tablespoons miso
2 tablespoons tomato paste
mixed herbs (any of: oregano, thyme, tarragon, marjoram, sage, cumin)

Instructions:

Rinse and drain lentils, being sure to pick through them to make sure there are no stones. Rinse and drain quinoa. Add to slow cooker.

Dice potatoes and sweet potato, and chop garlic. Add to slow cooker along with herbs (dried or fresh and finely chopped), tomato paste and 6 cups of the water.

Cook on high for 3-1/2 to 4 hours. When the stew thickens and cooks down after about 2.5 hours add 1 additional cup water. Usually the lentils and quinoa will cook before the potatoes do, and potato cooking time will vary depending on how big the pieces are. Once everything is cooked, turn off the heat, add tamari and let set a further half hour.

Mix the miso and remaining 1/2 cup of water, then add to the stew and mix well.

Serves 6.

Serving Suggestions:

• Serve with grated parmesan on top
• Serve with toasted sesame seeds or gomasio (toasted sesame seeds and salt) on top for a vegan alternative
• Use barley instead of quinoa

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Splitpea & Chickpea Soup

This thick, hearty stew can make a filling meal all on it’s own, or can be served with warmed pita bread, dipped in olive oil and salt. Or, if you’re feeling really hungry,  a thick slice of homemade wholemeal bread, toasted and served with butter or olive oil. It’s a great winter warmer, but I love it even in the summer, or anytime I’m craving a protein hit.

Ingredients:
2 cups dried green split peas
1 cup dried chickpeas
8 cups water
2 teas tarragon
1 teas oregano
1 teas marjoram
1 teas Moroccan spice
1 T tomato paste
1 T vegetable stock powder
2 T miso paste, or salt to taste
1 handful unflavored TVP pieces (optional)
1 medium potato or sweet potato, diced (optional) *

Instructions:
Put everything but the miso/salt into the crockpot and turn on high. Let cook for 5 hours, or until the split peas cook to the point where they look pureed, stirring occasionally.

Add the miso:
When done, turn off the heat. Mix the 2 T miso with enough water to cover in a small bowl or cup. I like to use young white miso, which is what I’d recommend if you are new to miso as it has the mildest taste. Otherwise, use your favorite miso. Blend the miso paste with a fork until it is dissolved in the water, adding more water as needed. Add this miso mixture to the crock pot and stir in thoroughly.

If you’re not using miso, add salt, herb salt or garlic salt to taste. The flavor of salt disappears during cooking, so by adding salt after the meal has cooked you don’t need as much to get the same flavor.

South Beach Diet Notes:
If you are in phase one of the South Beach diet, leave out the potato/sweet potato. You won’t miss it and this filling, protein-rich meal won’t leave you hungry. Eat on it’s own or with a side salad.

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• Crockpots
• Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker: 200 Recipes for Healthy and Hearty One-Pot Meals That Are Ready When You Are

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1. Slow Cooker Lentil & Quinoa Stew This hearty lentil stew is an easy to cook, high protein meal that suits those on low carb diets – such as the South Beach diet and low GI diets....
2. Raw Vegan Miso Vegetable Soup with Zucchini and Pumpkin Noodles As winter time approaches here in New Zealand I’ve been thinking about a strategy for stay raw throughout the winter. I know from past experience that while it’s easy and...
3. Garden Vegetable Soup Since I haven’t gotten around to making any raw soups yet, I thought I’d go in search of a video recipe, and I found a good one. Garden Vegetable Soup,...