Soup Joumou (Pumpkin Soup)

Back when I was living in Pennsylvania, my dear Tati Chantal came from New York to prepare the traditional Soup Joumou. She was such an amazing cook and I am sad I didn't pay more attention when she made other recipes as well. Since Haitian's don't tend to follow recipes, I have to write this out of memory. Here goes...

Serving: 10- 12 (The tradition is to serve anyone who comes over for soup on the 1st, so I don't know how to reduce it to a smaller serving size)

It is a lengthy process so if you are not in the mood for spending hours in the kitchen this is not for you.

Ingredients:
1 1lb beef for stew
1 1lb beef with bones for stew
2 pig feet cut for stew or oxtail
4 potatoes, peeled and cubed
2 yams, peeled and cubed
1 malanga roots, peeled and cubed
2 turnips, peeled and cubed
3 medium carrots, chopped
1 medium pumpkin, peeled and cubed (1 butternut squash works too)
1 tbs of tomato paste
1 6oz. package of pasta of your choice, I use rigatoni
2 stalks of parsley
1 stalk of Thyme
1 Stalk of celery chopped
2 habanero peppers.

4 whole cloves
1 half medium cabbage, shredded
Water as needed

Meat seasoning:
4 tbsp of "Sofrito" or "epis"*
2 Chicken bouillon cubes
2 tsp salt

2 tsp pepper
1 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp Tabasco sauce
2 tbsp olive oil

* Since I have not yet perfected the art of making sofrito/epis, my wonderful mother has been shipping it to me. Ready made sofrito can be found in many local grocery store (Hispanic section)

Let the cooking begin!

Meat 

• Clean the meat with a mixture of either lemon juice or orange juice and salt, rinse well and repeat. 
• Mix all seasoning with meat and place in a stockpot along with half of the olive oil
• Tie both parsley and thyme together and place in the pot. 

• Cover with water and let boil over medium heat for at least an hour. Keep covered until water begins to evaporate. If meat is not cut in small chunks, you may need to cook it for longer than one hour. 
• Remove meat from broth and set the broth aside to prepare the squash. 
• In another pot, add remaining olive oil and stir in the tomato paste. Let paste fry over medium heat. Careful to not let it burn 
• Stir in the meat and occasionally simmer water until the meat gains a nice brown/red color and set aside.

Vegetables

• In as very large stockpot, add carrots, turnip, yam, malanga,celery, potatoes and cabbage. I personally like to leave the potatoes for later in the cooking process. They tend to fall apart in the soup when cooked for too long making it too thick
• Cover vegetables with water and let boil for about an hour on high heat. 

      Pumpkin

• Place pumpkin in another pot of boiling water. Cook over high heat until tender. 
• Once it is fully cooked, remove from pot and use the broth from the meat to blend the pumpkin to a soft puree. You may want to consider using a strainer to make sure there are no lumps. 

•  Add the pumpkin puree and the meat to the vegetable stockpot. After the vegetables are cooked of course. 
• Add macaroni and let cook for another 20 mins. 
• Reduce cooking temperature to a low medium heat. 
• Occasionally stir the soup and let cook for about an hour. Not sure why you are suppose to use a wooden spoon, but my aunt swears by it. 
• Add habanero pepper. Unless you like spicy soup, make sure to not let the pepper fall apart in the soup. 
• Let simmer and serve hot...enjoy!