Serves 8
Active time: 15 minutes || Total time: 40 minutes
For this recipe, I went into kitchen and stared at the kale for like a half hour. What would you like me to do with you, kale? Guide me, oh ruffly one! When that failed, I threw it into a soup.
The results were a grab-bag of texture! The kale is rugged and chewy, the rice is fluffed up and soaked through with flavor, and the sweet potatoes are tender but not mushy, just the perfect sweet bite. All of this in a creamy, coconut base bursting with all of those sensuous red curry flavors. The gingery aroma will waft through your entire mansion! So stop spending money on scented candles, soup is the best aromatherapy.
Notes: Since curry pastes vary from brand to brand, start with 2 tablespoons and add more from there. I didn’t make this very spicy but I definitely serve it with plenty of Sriracha. If you would like to use brown rice, that’s fine! Just let it boil for 20 minutes more before adding the sweet potatoes and kale.
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 small onion, diced medium
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
3/4 cups basmati or jasmine rice, rinsed
6 cups vegetable broth
1 teaspoon salt
2 to 3 tablespoons red curry paste
1 bunch purple kale, pulled from stems and torn into bite size pieces
1 large sweet potato, peeled, cut into 1/2 inch chunks
1 can lite coconut milk
1 tablespoon agave syrup
Juice of one lime
Optional: fresh chopped cilantro to garnish
Preheat a 4 quart soup pot over medium heat. Saute onion in oil with a pinch of salt for 5 minutes or so, until translucent. Add garlic and ginger and saute a minute more.
Add rice, vegetable broth and salt, cover pot and bring to a boil.
Once boiling, lower heat to simmer. Mix in 2 tablespoons curry paste. Add kale and sweet potatoes. Cover pot and let simmer for about 15 minutes, until sweet potatoes are tender.
Add coconut milk, agave and lime. Taste for salt and flavor. Add more curry paste if you like.
Remove from heat and serve immediately, or even better let it sit for 10 minutes to give the flavors a chance to meld. Top with fresh chopped cilantro if you like.
Fantastic! I doubled the kale because I’m trying trying to add more veggies to my diet. Very satisfying!
oooooooohm’gosh so good!! I used bamboo shoots, straw mushrooms and tiny peas instead of kale and sweet potatoes. I ate the whole pot in about one day.
Has anyone tried freezing this soup? I want to make & bring it to a National Soup Swap Day party this weekend but it needs to be frozen for the swap.
YUM! Soooo good, I used chard and the juice of two limes. Oh yeah, tangy and delicious! Next time I might double the greens and cut down the rice a bit.
I made this with brown rice. For the vegetables, in addition to the sweet potato, I used chard, bamboo shoots, and a yellow pepper. I also cubed and fried two containers of tofu, and threw that in at the very end with the coconut milk. Since I was throwing so much extra stuff in, I upped my rice to one cup, and added an extra cup of vegetable broth. I ended up using about 4 tablespoons of Thai Kitchen red curry paste. This soup is thick (the way I like it) and delicious. (And, I have enough to last me about 10 more meals!! I freeze individual servings, so the deliciousness will prevail for quite a while!)
(Oh, and, I forgot to add the lime juice or agave. It’s still delicious.)
i have made this four times in the past two weeks. it is that good.
So appreciate the mix of deeply nourishing vegetables! Thanks for your beautiful web site!
Just made this as we wait for Hurricane Sandy to maybe attack tomorrow, or the next day, or…. Delicious comfort food. One addition is sliced almonds as a garnish for a nice crunch. My husband says I’m a good cook, I say I’m a good recipe chooser and follow directions really well. Thanks Isa for making me look good.
I have some broccoli greens from my farm share box. Would that work in place of the kale or will the flavor be off?
My roommate made this recipe a few weeks back and I CANNOT believe how awesome it tasted. She made a huge vat, and I seriously wanted to eat the whole thing. Will be making it myself in the near future.
Folks, this is delicious! I’ve made it many times now.
Be certain not to overcook once you add rice and potatoes. I did that once, and the rice absorbed a lot of water and created mush. Bummer.
This is so so so good that I can’t even stand it! I made a vat of it and it won’t serve 8. It’ll serve 1 – ME.
Best soup of my lyyyyyyyfe!!
I added jalapeño to garlic and ginger. I also added tumeric and coriander to the onions. Also added a can of chickpeas. Awesome awesome meal. I made the brown rice separately and added it later while everything was simmering. Thank you, Isa!!
As everyone else said, this soup is delicious! I made it tonight for my boyfriend who is sick, and it hit the spot for both of us. I used brown rice which added depth and a perfect texture. We had some local sweet potatoes and purple kale luckily. I didn’t think I liked sweet potatoes either until I made this. Thank you so much! It was a delicious, hearty, healthy, nutrient packed meal. Plus, soups are my favorite!
Just made this and loved it!!!! What a treat for the senses, the bright orange and dark green colors, the fabulous comforting aroma, and the ginger-coconut, curry flavors-YUM!
I just made this a few hours ago…I didn’t have kale and jasmine rice so I subbed with baby spinach and brown rice, and it was amazing! Thanks for sharing such an awesome soup recipe! =)
De-lish! Super super yummy. I hate straying from the original recipes, since they are always fantastic as is, but all I had was green curry paste and green kale. I added chickpeas and I can’t wait for this review to be done so I can go get another bowl.
We had this for dinner the other night (from the “Isa Does It!” cookbook.. of the gods) and it was nothing short of incredible. One of my favorite non-chocolate things to ever come out of my kitchen. Thank you, Isa!
Very, very good. Only thing I did differently was used some pre- cooked brown rice I had on hand and pre- baked sweet potatoes. This is not only a tasty soup, but it is very pretty too! Leftovers were also delicious.
Yum diddly. Had about half of the required rice of the brown type in the fridge, chucking it in at the end with the cooked basmati rice. The texture combo was magnificent – the white rice had nearly melted & thickened up the soup, the brown rice provided a fab chewy texture.
Used faux chicken stock, plus carrots to supplement our small quantity of sweet potato. This is our favourite, go-to-kale dish. Can’t believe we haven’t made it for nearly a year it was SO GOOD!
Love this soup!!! Have made it many times and it never fails to please the taste buds and the soup-lovers soul
This soup is one of the ways I get my spouse to eat sweet potatoes, which he claims not to like. The soup is just plain good. We like lots of spice and flavor so I am heavy handed with the curry paste.
Delicious! And pretty easy to make.
So awesome, my 8 month old even loved it – he chowed it down!
I made this over the weekend. I subbed brown basmati and increased the cooking time before adding the kale and sweet potatoes by 25 minutes. Loved the simplicity and the flavors! It makes a lot, so I will have great leftovers this week!
I got this recipe from the cookbook, and unfortunately there is a typo in the book that says to use 1 pound of kale (?!). I added 2 bunches….which was a lot. There was pretty much no coconut or red curry flavor which was disappointing. Now I’m stuck with a huge vat of gross soup. Why purchase the book when the edited recipes are available online? Don’t want your money!
Fragrant and delicious soup. My kids came out of their rooms to ask what was cooking. My bf said it tastes like a meal from a fancy restaurant. A new favorite soup for us. My kale was over the hill, so I used broccoli and cauliflower instead. You are amazing, Isa, thank you for creating the best recipes!