Caribbean Beef Soup

You will need:

For the meat
2 1/ 2 lb lean beef
3-4 tablespoon beef seasoning
For the soup
1-1 1/ 2 lb pumpkin cubed
8 cups water
2 cups okra chopped
2-3 large carrots chopped and halved
5-6 corn cobs
Provision of your choosing (washed and cut up)
10 pimento
10 sprigs of small thyme (3 large broad leaf thyme)
1 small onion chopped
2 sprigs chive whole
3 garlic cloves chopped
3-4 tablespoon homemade soup mix (use whole packet of cock/pumpkin soup mix if you’re not using my home-made version)
1 hot pepper salt, garlic granules and black pepper to taste

Method:
For the meat/pumpkin preparation. Place the washed meat in a medium sized bowl with the beef seasoning, coat and leave to infuse overnight or a few hours. To make the soup. Bring 8 cups of water to the boil. Once boiled, add the beef and allow to simmer on medium heat (covered for 45 minutes). Add the pumpkin and stir. Add the okra, corn, carrots, onion, chives, garlic and soup mix, pimento, provision, thyme and hot pepper. Allow to continue to simmer on low/medium heat, covered for 40-45 minutes, or until the soup starts to thicken. If the soup isn’t thick enough, mix together 1tbsp of starch with 2 tbsp of warm water and then stir it in. Do a taste test and adjust for salt/garlic/black pepper if needed. Remove the thyme stems and hot pepper before serving.

Tip: Feel free to pressure cook the meat with seasoning before hand if needed.