Cream of Pumpkin

It's freezing here. In Okinawan terms, that is.

rarely do temperatures dip below 15 degrees in winter, but this year the thermometers have been hovering at 12-14 degrees for the past few days. in case readers are sniggering about how i seem to be making such an issue of okinawa's relatively balmy-sounding winter, a walk outside will be all it takes to silence the cynics.

it doesnt snow here, but the strong northern winds are enough to freeze your underpants off. and it helps little that we are living in an old, rickety apartment that seems to be letting in drafts of cold.

so now here i am, clad in three layers of clothing and typing with cold fingers. tried to fend off the shivers by trying out a very simple recipe for cream of pumpkin soup (thank you ma for giving me your women's weekly cookbook..it is a godsend!) for dinner today and it was mouth-watering, lip-smackingly delicious!

started off by caramelizing half a brown onion and four cloves of chopped garlic in a pot, before adding in one large potato and half a pumpkin (both cut into chunks).

then i added three cups of chicken stock (take the shortcut like me and just dissolve two knorr chicken cubes in warm water) before letting the mixture come to a boil.

i let the soup simmer for a further 20 minutes to soften the vegetables, and then processed the soup by passing the entire mixture through a sift (which was a huge pain in the ass, by the way). i then returned the pot of soup to the stove and added in a quarter cup of milk.

all the hard work sifting by hand paid off eventually because the soup turned out so robust and flavourful that i didnt have to add any salt! just a generous sprinkling of coarse black pepper and my dinner was ready!
one painful regret though - i didnt have any bread at home to go with the soup and i was too chicken to venture out in the cold to buy some. Tsk.
note to self: buy a hand blender so you can try making all other types of cream soups!