A can of boiled peanuts got me started on this recipe, though they make no appearance in the soup. Along with the bitter melon and donut peaches and chiles I told you about yesterday, I also purchased a can of a Southern delicacy - boiled peanuts. I'll be trying those later on in an install ment of "I Wouldn't Eat It".

But those legumes put peanuts on my brain. Somehow the peanut thought got lodged in a piece of the brain that was thinking about spinach, and this quick and delicious recipe was born. I'd originally only intended to use half the spinach I use in the recipe, but it needed it. It called out to me and said - "Barrett, more spinach, please."

Who am I to disagree with a talking recipe?

I find recipes with spinach sauteed with a peanut sauce and African peanut and groundnut stews online, but I don't see anything like this anywhere. For now, I'm claiming this as an original, but I invite you to put your own stamp on the recipe.

This recipe takes about 30 minutes from start to end.

Spinach-Peanut Soup
2 tablespoons peanut oil
1/2 white onion, diced
2 cloves garlic
1 lb. baby spinach, picked, washed, dried
2 small hot chile peppers
1 teaspoon cumin
1 quart vegetable stock
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
2 lemons, zest and juice
salt to taste
peanuts in the shell for garnish

Heat two tablespoons of peanut oil in a stock pot. Add sliced onions and ginger garlic and reduce heat to medium. Add a pinch of salt and stir. Sweat onions until they are soft and sweet. Add the chile peppers.

Add 1/4 of the stock and half the spinach. Cover. Cook five minutes. Add the rest of the spinach and cover. Cook for five more minutes.

Add the rest of the stock, the cumin, and the peanut butter. Stir very well. Cook covered for about ten minutes.

Use an immersion blender to blend the soup smooth. Add the zest of two lemons and their juice and stir well. Serve with peanut garnish.