Jamaican Pepper Pot soup

M...eat...less

At most restaurants in Jamaica, these are your soup choices: pumpkin, pepper pot or red peas soup. All three of which are usually quite tasty. I almost never order the pepper pot soup, it’s an ok soup to me, but I will choose pumpkin soup all day every day. And while we make pumpkin soup and red pea’s soup at home all the time we hardly ever make pepper pot soup. Let’s face it, not many Jamaicans will take precious callaloo and make it into a soup, instead of sautéing it and eating it with fried dumpling and plantain. We surely don’t,  but today I have tried my best to recreate what I've been  eating all these years at restaurants…minus the ocra.

Some might argue that without a few okra in the soup to give it ‘body’ its not a true pepper pot soup. Or that without the pigs tail and beef if not a true pepper pot either. And I may have to agree, my soup didn’t have the same consistency as some. Not to mention I totally blended my callaloo way to small. Next time I would do a mix of finely chopped and blended so you can actually see the green leafs in the soup. But that’s not even the biggest issue I had. Because I'm so ‘nuff and extra’ I decided to make my own vegetable broth instead of using a boullion or a store bought broth.

It was a whole lot of work, and honestly I wish I had just used a regular old swanson vegetable broth  because it took me the entire day to make a stupid pot of soup lol. But whatever at least you all have received a recipe on how to make an easy veggie broth. And about the soup….it was ok, I feel no different about this homemade version than I do the ones at restaurants. Not bad, but I still prefer my pumpkin soup.

Ingredients (printable recipe)

For the broth

1 tablespoon Coconut oil

3 Onions

2 Carrots

2 heads  Garlic

2 tablespoon Allspice

Salt to taste

Water to fill stock pot

1 Scotch bonnet pepper

1 bunch Thyme

3 stalk scallion

For the soup

1 large bunch Callaloo

1 Onion

2 Garlic cloves

2 cups Coconut milk

Salt to taste

1 tablespoon Sugar

Dumplings (optional see how to make them here )

6 okra chopped (optional)

2 cups Pumpkin

3 potatoes

Instructions

For the broth

• Roughly chop, onions, carrots, scallion, thyme, and garlic
• Place the coconut oil in a hot stock pot, sauté the veggies until they begin to get brown, I prefer a seasoned broth so I salt my veggies heavily to pull out more moisture while they brown
• Fill the pot with water add allspice berries and a whole uncut hot pepper and bring to a boil (the more water you add the less concentrated the broth so if you want it richer use less water)
• Once boiling reduce to a simmer and let it cook for about two hours
• After the two hours I remove it from the heat and allow it to completely cool. If you’re making the soup at a later date, just strain and store the broth in the freezer

For the soup

• Add the broth and callaloo to the pot and cook the callaloo in the seasoned broth for about 10 minutes
• Remove the callaloo from the pot and pulse in a in a blender to give it a rough chop and add it back to the pot
• Finely chop, onion and shred garlic, add to the pot
• Add pumpkins, potatoes, ocra and dumplings (optional)
• After the potatoes, pumpkin and dumplings are almost cooked season the pot to taste with the sugar, salt and the coconut milk
• Allow it to simmer and become slightly creamy
• serve

Xoxo Greedygirl