Fall Vegetable Bisque

Some people were asking about a recipe for a bisque that was served at our church's potluck meal this Sunday. This is very similar to another bisque that I posted here, except this time i used sweet potatoes instead of butternut squash. So I've decided to call this "Fall Vegetable Bisque", because you can easily use sweet potatoes, yams, butternut squash, acorn squash, or even pumpkin, whatever has grown well that year, in your area.

This recipe is going to be fore 25 to 30 people. If you'd like a smaller recipe, use the butternut squash bisque recipe, or just divide this one.

I used:
10 medium to large sweet potatoes
4 large onions (yellow, red, white, whatever)
4 red bell peppers (red are the best flavor for this, but yellow or orange work, not green)
1 head of garlic
1 gallon of vegetable broth (i used water and vegetable BTB)
4 cans of coconut milk
cooking oil
salt
pepper
cumin
chili powder
Sriracha
apple cider vinegar

Start off by heating the vegetable broth in a large pot. That takes a while to get up to boiling.

Then I took out all of my sweet potatoes, washed and peeled them (though you don't have to peel them, i suppose. Do what your heart tells you). Then I cut them into 1 inch cubes (doesn't need to be pretty, just get them into smaller pieces).

As soon as the broth is up to temperature, I put in the sweet potatoes. Meanwhile, chop up the onions and garlic and peppers. I like to caramelize the onions before adding them to the soup, and also brown the garlic, but that doesn't have to happen. If you do fry the onions first, i like to add some sriracha to the oil while they're cooking. I don't really know what this does for the soup, but it makes the kitchen smell really good. If you don't want to do that, just put a little sriracha in the soup at any other point.

To cook the onions and garlic in the same oil, at the same time, put the onions in first. Wait until they just start to brown along the edges, and then add the garlic. They'll both be ready at about the same time.

Once your onions and garlic are ready, throw that into your broth with the sweet potatoes. Also add in your red peppers now. That will all want to cook together for 10 - 15 minutes (you'll notice the sweet potatoes starting to fall apart as you stir it, this is a good sign that it's ready to be blended). While you're waiting for everything, add your salt and pepper, and spices. I like to put in chili powder, cumin, sriracha and apple cider vinegar. But feel free to experiment with what you like. Perhaps some red curry paste; or maybe go the Italian route with some basil and oregano (what the heck, throw in some more garlic too); or for a little Cajun flair, add some chili powder, cayenne pepper, a jalapeno and a healthy amount of thyme.

Once everything is soft enough, take it off the heat, and get out your blender. It takes a while if you only have a regular blender (like i do), if you've got one of those fancy hand blenders, or wand blenders, that must be nice. However you do it, get it to a nice smooth consistency.

After it's blended, i mix in the coconut milk, you can use other types of cream if you want. I love coconut milk. But use whatever you feel like.

That's it. Perhaps serve it with a nice grilled cheese sandwich (or if you want to be fancier, i served it with a grilled tomato basil and mozzarella sandwich).