Creamy Garlic Soup

I took note over dinner as my brother used his bread to scrape up the last remaining drops of his second serving of soup. This must be good, he never likes soup. Then while he was cleaning the dishes something unusual happened, he didn't complain! And as he was loading the dishwasher he casually says "You should make this once a week", and he's completely serious. The non-soup eater wants to eat soup once a week!? That's the moment I knew this soup was damn good.  The coolest part about this soup is it's a natural antibiotic that will be sure to knock out any bad guys brewing inside you. And I promise for a soup with garlic in the name and how many cloves?! in it the garlic taste is strangely subtle.

26 unpeeled garlic cloves (roughly 2 1/2 heads)
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons plant-based butter
1/4 teaspoon cayenne powder
2-3 tablespoons ginger (I use the ginger that comes in the squeeze tube in the refrigerated herb section, it's not as fibrous and less time consuming then grating 3 tbsps of fresh)
1 large onion, sliced (roughly 2 1/4 cups)
1 1/2 teaspoons fresh thyme
26 peeled garlic cloves (roughly 2 1/2 heads)
4 cups organic vegtable broth
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
1 lemon, cut into 4 wedges
4 large pieces of preferred bread (I used both pumpernickel and ciabatta bread)

Preheat your oven to 350°F. In a small glass dish add the 26 pieces of unpeeled garlic cloves drizzled with the olive oil and a sprinkle of salt, bake covered in the oven for 45 minutes. You can use tin foil if you don't have a glass or clay lid to cover your small dish. Once done, place the baking dish in the freezer for 10 minutes to cool. Once cooled squeeze out the garlic using your fingers and place the roasted garlic in a small bowl and set aside.

In a stock pot over medium high heat melt the butter and saute the onions, cayenne powder, ginger, and thyme for 6 minutes, or until onions are transparent. Add in the roasted garlic cloves and the raw garlic cloves and saute for 3 minutes. Add the vegetable broth, cover and simmer until the raw garlic is soft, about 20 minutes.

Drizzle a little bit of olive oil over your bread and bake it in the toaster on the broil setting until it's crispy.

In batches blend the soup, then return to the stock pot and stir in the almond milk. Ladle the soup into four bowls, squeezing one wedge of lemon into each bowl; serve with a piece of the hot crispy bread.

Makes 4 servings, recipe slightly adapted from Anna Bailey