Let me tell you, this makes a MASSIVE pot of soup! You will need to freeze some.  When you thaw it will be a bit chunky.  Just toss in the blender and wiz it, and it will be smooth again.  If you have a kick ass blender, you can even warm it in your blender (less pots = win)

Ingredients:

• 16 oz portabello mushrooms
• 24 oz cremini mushrooms
• 24 oz button mushrooms
• ½ cup olive oil for drizzling
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• ½ cup fresh thyme (stems and all)
• 6 whole sprigs fresh rosemary

• 5 tbsp ghee (link) (or olive oil if you’re sensitive to ghee)
• 6 cup diced white or Spanish onions
• 2 ½ cup diced celery
• 6 bay leaves
• 1 tbsp fresh thyme
• 3 tbsp arrowroot starch
• 1 tsp hot sauce of choice
• 3 tbsp sherry vinegar (use balsamic if you don’t have sherry vinegar)
• 10 cups beef stock
• 1 cup soaked cashews (*** Soak several hours and drain.  If you don’t have time – you can omit soaking them.)
• Sea salt – just add to taste  (This will vary depending on how much salt is in your stock.)

Instructions:

Prepare the mushrooms:

1. Line two cookie sheets or roasting pans with parchment paper. Lay your mushrooms out on the two pans and drizzle with oil.  Toss to coat mushrooms.
2. Sprinkle with sea salt and pepper. Add your herbs and mix once more.
3. Roast 350 for 15-20 minutes stirring half way.

While the mushrooms are in the oven prepare the vegetables and broth:

1. Add the ghee (or olive oil) to a large soup pot on medium high heat. Once ghee is hot add your onions and celery and sauté for 5 minutes.
2. Add bay leaves, thyme and hot sauce.
3. Stir about 5 more minutes until mixture is soft.
4. (Now might be a good time to stir your mushrooms in the oven.)
5. Turn the heat element down to medium.
6. Add arrowroot starch and stir to coat everything and cook for a minute or two.
7. Add sherry vinegar and stir to incorporate.
8. Add your stock and bring up to a boil.
9. Your mushrooms should be about done.  You will know when your kitchen smells awesome!  Toss the mushrooms into the boiling soup pot.  Be sure to get all the drippings and little bits. They are super flavourful.  Give the soup a big stir and make sure everything is all mixed in and reduce the heat.
10. Add the cashews.  This is what we are using in place of cream.
11. 

    Into the Blender!

    Now it’s time to blend this sucker.  I filled the blender three times so I needed another big pot to put the blended soup in.  Fill your blender and go. Blend until everything is totally smooth. Don’t worry about the herb stems. They are still full of flavour and won’t stand a chance in  the blender.  By dumping the blended soup into another pot I made sure to finish with one uniformly blended batch.  Otherwise it’s impossible to get the same ratio of ingredients in each blender batch.

12. Taste your soup. Depending on how much salt is in your stock, you might need to add a few pinches more.

Serve with cashew sour cream, seed crackers or, just as it is.  I love the flavour of thyme (I love most herbs) so I tossed some more as garnish.

*** Ideally you should soak the cashew nuts for five or more hours.  Soaking them not only makes them easier to blend but easier to digest.  By soaking the nuts in water phytic acid, an anti-nutrient is removed.  If not removed by soaking this component can pull nutrients from the nuts, reducing the nutritional value.