Traditional Maltese Kusksu

Summer is over and once we start getting the cold wet grey weather I add some recipes to my weekly food. Warm soups start to appear more often on my table. Below is the recipe of a traditional Maltese style kusksu soup which is a creamy vegetable soup with broad beans, peas and a special type of pasta called kusksu.

This recipe serves 4.

Ingredients

• 1 onion
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 carrot
• 1 potato
• 1 courgette (half if you have the long courgettes as opposed to the round ones)
• 8 tomatoes or a can of tomatoes
• 2 cans of water (you can use the can of tomatoes as a measure)

• Broad beans (ful)
• Peas
• Pepper
• Ricotta or Maltese goat cheeselets (gbejniet)
• 1-2 tablesppons kusksu pasta (I use Barilla Tempesta). If you cannot find this pasta use any other sort of soup pasta, for example the small snail shaped pasta.

Steps

• Sautee the onion, garlic, carrot, potato and courgette in some olive oil
• In a pan add the above ingredients together with tomatoes and water
• Leave cooking for 30 minutes
• Squash the mixture with a food processor
• Add the pepper, broad beans and peas and leave for another 30 minutes
• Add the pasta to the pan around 10 minutes (or as indicated on the package) before serving. 
• Serve with ricotta or Maltese goat cheese-lets

Notes
If you cooked a large amount of kusku and you're not planning to eat all of it in one go, it's best to add the pasta only to the portions you will be serving.You can then add pasta when reheating the extra kusku portions.

Recipe Origin

This recipe is one of the hundreds of recipes mama Formosa.