Made a red lentil and ham hough soup. It doesn't look too inviting but I would quite happily eat this for breakfast, lunch and dinner with thickly buttered crusty loaf until there is none left, then I'll lick any remaining spoons on offer.
I don't soak the smoked hough. Instead, quickly boil for 10 minutes, chuck the water out then refill the pot with 4/5 ltr cold water, bring to the boil and simmer for two hours. Meanwhile, thinly slice/dice 2 large or 4 small carrots, 3 sticks of celery and 1 large or 2 small onions. Sweat these in a separate pan over a low heat with 2 tbsp butter for 20 minutes, lid on stirring occasionally so they don't catch.
Add 3 crushed garlic cloves and continue to sweat for another 2 minutes.
While the garlic is mingling lift the hough out of the stock and set aside to cool but
keep the stock!! When the 2 minutes is up throw 600g of split red lentils rinsed with cold water into the sweated veg. Cover this lentil & veg base with the saved hough stock water; you're looking for about an inch or two above the veg & lentil base. If you've not enough stock, add water. Simmer (stirring often) for 35 /40 minutes.
While the soup is simmering use 2 forks to strip the hough. You want to separate the meat from the fat and skin (I know, I know, but it's worth it)
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. Be quite thorough but don't worry if there are streaks of fat left in with the meat Think pulled pork ish.
When the soup is thick, remember to keep stirring, chuck the stripped hough back in, turn off the heat and season to taste. White pepper is better than black pepper at this stage. Also, taste before adding salt as the hough stock will be salty.
It's always better if you leave it until the day after.
Some people blitz the veg & lentils before adding the ham but naw! If you've followed this and your veg is thinly sliced/diced you should have a thick, thick soup with visible veg and ham.