Sauerkraut Soup from Estonia

Nupur's latest Blog Bites #4 is all about unearthing some of the stuff thats been lurking in the kitchen and use another blog as an inspiration to use up some/ all of the lurking ingredients. Here is my first contribution, using up half of a jar of sauerkraut from 2008, that was a gift from a friend. I wasn't really keen on using this before and had it tucked away in some corner shelf. So, when Shankar pulled it out as one of the first things I should use up, I was glad to find this wonderful soup recipe from Pille at Nami-Nami. Given that is it from Estonia, I am also ticking off one more country in my Cooking the World. 

It was a simple soup to make, the only laborious(!) part is chopping the veggies. Given the chilly weather we have been having in WI for the last couple of days, the soup was wonderful with Purkouri for dinner. Basically I sautéed 1/2 a chopped onion and about 1/2 a jar of sauerkraut (after rinsing it) in a little ghee (ingredient needing to be used up), added 2 chopped carrots and 2 chopped golden potatoes, 1 tbsp of tomato paste (another ingredient that has been lurking) and enough water. I also added a bay leaf, salt, pepper and a pinch of nutmeg for seasoning. Let this cook for about 20 minutes. I thickened the soup a little bit with a tsp of rice flour. I also added a handful of chopped walnuts before turning off the heat. These walnuts became the magic ingredient adding a whole lot of texture to the soup! I added a dollop of quark on top and garnished with some shredded carrots and mint. Yummy!