Cream of Cashew Pea Soup

Ingredients

• •¼ cup olive oil
• •2 large onions
• •2 stalks celery
• •4 cloves garlic
• •to taste kosher salt and pepper
• •2 cups raw cashews
• •2 tablespoons raw or light brown sugar
• •1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• •2 pounds frozen sugar snap or green peas
• •1 tablespoon malt vinegar
• •for garnish scallions and potato chips

Cooking Instructions

1. 1.

   Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-low. Add onions, celery, and garlic and cook, stirring often and adding a splash or so of water if the bottom of pan gets too brown, until golden brown, 30-40 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Add cashews, sugar, red pepper flakes, and 3 cups water and bring mixture to a simmer. Cook until vegetables are very soft and losing their structure, 10-15 minutes.

   40 min

2. 2.

   Blend one-third of sugar snap peas with one-third of vegetable mixture in a blender, adding some cooking liquid from vegetable mixture as needed to thin, until very smooth, about 2 minutes. Press purée through a fine-mesh sieve into a medium saucepan; discard solids. Working in 2 batches, repeat with remaining peas and vegetable mixture, adding water as needed if you run out of cooking liquid. If soup is still very thick, thin with water until you get a velvety, pourable consistency. (You should have about 7 cups soup.)

   15 min

3. 3.

   Stir vinegar into soup; season with more salt and pepper and warm over medium-low until heated through.

   5 min

4. 4.

   Serve soup topped with scallions and potato chips.

   2 min

5. 5.

   Soup can be made 2 days ahead. Let cool; cover and chill. Reheat over medium-low, thinning with water as needed until pourable.