Sweet Potato and Spicy Sausage Soup

The sweet potato debate runs rampant in the paleo world.  Some say yes some say no blah blah blah.  Robb Wolf, the author of the Paleo Solution, says they are a paleo food, so i'll take his word for it.  They are a starchy root vegetable, and are non-toxic, unlike a regular potato.  Sweet potatos have a ton of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, and some people claim it is in fact the world's healthiest food.  That might be pushing it but, they are also a good source of glucose, which is why many people chose to eat sweet potatoes as a post workout meal.  The reality is, there is debate over many foods that we eat, some people say no to fruit, some only eat chicken and turkey, some say nuts are bad.  I'm certainly not a nutritionist, I base what I eat on research that i've done, or based on what Coach Jay and Coach Colin tell me ( because I know they've done they're research).  Like any other food, you don't want to eat sweet potatoes in bulk, i'd eat them post workout, or as a side dish, or in the case of this soup one bowl of it.

My favorite time of the day to work out is noon.  I'm not a morning person, and I don't like to work out too late.  I don't always get to workout at this time, but I do when I can.  So usually my post workout meal is also my lunch, and my favorite lunch is soup!  So here is a recipe I found on http://paleodietlifestyle.com/  . Sweet potato and Sausage Soup, I just finished making it and it was delicious! My House also smells amazing right now.  Here is the link for the actual recipe, of course I changed it up a tiny bit. I'll post what I used below...SweetPotato&SausageSoup

Here's what you need

- 1 3/4 lbs of sweet potatoes peeled and chopped into chunks.( I used that big guy and half the smaller guy)
- 2 big or 3 small carrots chopped
- 1/2 pound of pork sausage-casings removed ( I used Pork Chorizo from whole foods)
- 1/2 onion chopped
- 2 cloves of garlic chopped
-1 1/2 tsp of curry powder
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 7 cups low sodium chicken broth
- 1 tbs of coconut oil to sautee veggies

- Check your ingredients just in case, some butchers/deli's/stores can be sneaky with their ingredients-- This one seems pretty good..now we can continue..

1.) Melt tbs of coconut oil in pan and add potatoes, sausage, garlic, onion, carrots, curry, and cinammon-- sautee for about 5 minutes and thoroughly mix.

2.) at the same time bring the chicken stock to a boil
3.)after cooking for about 5 minutes add everything to boiling chicken stock.

4.) Let everything boil covered for about 10 minutes or until the sweet potatoes are soft.
5.) Add everything to blender ( this makes alot of soup, I needed to run 3 batches through the blender)

6.) Blend eveything up well and its good to go!

I ran into a little issue while making this, I wanted to leave the sausage chunky to add to the soup, but I also wanted to cook the sausage with the veggies in the broth to keep all the flavor in the soup.  So after I realized picking tiny chunks of sausage out of the broth was going to take a billion years, I ended up just blending it all together like the recipe called for.  Next time I'm going to satuee the sausage first, then take out the sausage and put it separate and leave the grease in the pan and sautee the veggies in that and the coconut oil.  Then you can add the sausage at the end to have a chunkier soup, which I like.  ** Just an option, when you make it do it whichever way you want!