Review: Cream of Pumpkin Soup

This week for Whip It Up, I had a little help from Eric who suggested I try to make a pumpkin soup like we had in a restaurant once. The particular soup we had was technically a butternut squash soup, and it would be best described as liquid pumpkin pie. That may sound odd, but it was divine, and Eric's been wanting some more ever since.

I tried a recipe for butternut squash soup once, but it wasn't really what we were hoping, so I went with this recipe for this go-round. It was a hit! In fact, Eric said it was one of the best things I've ever made. And now let's get the necessary three questions answered:

1. The recipe was very easy to follow.
2. The dish tasted great!
3. I will definitely be making this soup again. And again. And again.

I did alter the recipes a little bit by adding some brown sugar to the soup and using fresh pumpkin. I do not have a food processor or blender here (I miss my kitchen supplies in Utah!), so I cooked the pumpkin in chicken broth, then I drained the broth and mashed the pumpkin. Then I added the broth back and stirred quite a bit to fix the consistency. Because I don't have a blender or food processor, the onions weren't processed, and that was the weak point of the soup.

As I made the soup I kept tasting it, and I was really, really doubtful about it until I added the cream at the end. It is really, really crucial to add the cream to finish off the soup.

Also, as you may notice on the recipe, it calls for some brown sugar and cinnamon croutons. I considered not bothering to make the croutons, and I'm so glad that I ignored that thought. The croutons were DIVINE! And, not only were they easy to make and exceptionally yummy, I am now eager to make my own croutons for salads in the future. No more boxed croutons for us!