Lentil Soup At Last

I finally got my lentils, but I no longer had the original recipe, so I used Cook's Illustrated's "hearty lentil soup with fragrant spice" recipe. It was my first time cooking lentil soup, and lentils in general continue to be a mystery, so I want to get all the details down.

The recipe called for coriander, cumin, cinnamon, and cayenne, but I think the soup would've been better without the fragrant spices. The bacon and the lentils themselves already had so much flavor, it seems a waste to use good ingredients and then mask them.

If the recipe were from anywhere but C-I, I'd be complaining about quality control: the recipe said to cook until the vegetables are softened - multiple times. How soft can a carrot get?? One step also calls for cooking until the lentils darkened - except they were already dark and speckled. Actually, I would argue the lentils lightened in the cooking process. Also, the recipe calls for 0.5c wine, 4.5c chicken broth, and 1.5c water. I like my soups less watery than most, so I left out the last; the final result was almost too watery for me even still. With that amount of liquid, I'd've assumed something in the soup was supposed to absorb water, but of course the lentils did not.

Despite the above complaints, I'm content with this batch of soup. It's warm and the nuttiness of the lentils is deeply satisfying.