Pumpkin Soup with Mole Sauce

This was kind of made up, but it worked.

Ingredients

• Soup
• 1 small pumpkin, peeled, insides scooped, chopped
• 1 apple, peeled and chopped
• 4c chicken stock
• pepper
• a couple of small, hot peppers, chopped
• Mole Sauce 
• pumpkin seeds from the pumpkin
• one onion, chopped
• garlic
• about 1tbsp dutch processed cocoa
• 1/4c raisins
• 1/4tsp cumin, coriander, cinnamon, cayenne, ancho chili powder, oregano, anise seed
• 2 dried chilies, seeds included
• 1-2 tomatoes (in our case, actually, about 3tbsp tomato paste)
• 1c chicken stock
• salt to taste
• water as necessary
• Some honey (optional - I like my mole a little sweeter)
• olive oil

First, scoop the seeds out of the pumpkin. Peel and chop the pumpkin. Toss with olive oil and some pepper and roast for about 30 minutes at 350, until soft.

Meanwhile, toast the pumpkin seeds in a pan with some olive oil until lightly toasted. Add onions and saute until translucent. Throw in the garlic and cook until fragrant. Put the onion, garlic, and pumpkin seeds in a blender with all the other ingredients, and blend until mostly smooth. At this point, I put the sauce on the stove and boiled for 15 minutes or so with some extra water, but I don't know if this is necessary? Anyway, press through a sieve into a bowl. Season to taste. DONE WITH MOLE.

The soup is so easy, it hardly counts as cooking. Add the pumpkin, apples, stock, and peppers to a pot. Cook until the apples are soft (about 20 minutes?) and blend (we used an immersion blender). Season to taste.

Serve soup with mole drizzled on top.

Thoughts: The soup was easy, but the mole took a while. Next time I would use almonds instead of pumpkin seeds, since I failed to hull the pumpkin seeds, I guess, and they were very tough. Anyway, the flavor combination worked, which I think we were all a little surprised about, since this was completely made up. But awesome! Claire says "interesting texture on the soup" - it's true, it was pretty thick, but velvety.

Disaster Index: 1/10