I used to love tinned soups. I would come home at lunchtime and crack open a can of Heinz Beef Broth or Minestrone, pour it into a bowl and microwave it (and I admit it, I used to enjoy seeing the peas explode), then devour it with several slices of thickly buttered bread.
That was until I decided to make my own soups. It started some years ago when I first Paul and I made him a Wild Rice Soup. I was discussing this very first soup with Paul the other night and I came to the conclusion that it was a forerunner for my Risotto making frenzy of 2004, so thick and creamy it was, that it barely resembled soup.
After that, I have made many types of soup. It can be a quick supper or a slow simmered make-ahead meal. It can be restorative or comforting or perhaps both. It can be thick or thin, chunky or smooth, healthy or rich with cream.
I know what you’re thinking: “But she said after her Soup Week that she had sworn off soups for probably life.” Ahh, but I cannot resist the seductive lure of the bowl of soup.
Last night was no exception. Paul, who feels the same ways as I do about soups, and with perhaps more nostalgia because he connects Soup and a Sandwich to summers spent with his Dad, wanted Toasted Cheese Sandwiches and Soup for Supper. A nicely alliterative dish, I’m sure you’ll agree. Fortunately for him, I had already thought about making Tomato Soup for a cooking event called Jhiva for Ingredients. This is my first entry into the event, and slightly inauspicious as I am a day late so hopefully the host, My Workshop, will not be too harsh on me!
Jhiva is Sanscrit for desire, deep longing and taste. The word also represents the tongue and taste buds. Jhiva for Ingredients is a celebration of natural ingredients used in Indian Cooking. Our job is simply to do the ingredients justice in whatever way we can.
This months ingredient is the tomato in all its incarnations and the only problem with the humble tom is which recipe to make for there is surely a surfeit of tomato dishes.
I have never made Tomato Soup before, and I have never been a fan of Tinned Tomato Soup, finding it too sweet, too synthetic and the texture to be too thick. I like soups to have a little texture to them.
This particular recipe is borrowed from one of my favourite TV Chefs, Rick Stein. His food is always unpretentious and most importantly accessible to the home cook. There is nothing worse than finding a recipe that you simply must cook but you just don't have the skills or you can't get hold of the ingredients.
What makes this Tomato Soup a little different to others is that it doesn't rely on the tomatoes being roasted and it is seasoned - heavily - with a homemade Tappenade. This soup also contains no less than six cloves of garlic in addition to the 3 in the Tappenade!
Suffice it to say, I slashed the amount of garlic in both, thinking of our social status the next day, not to mention Pauls icky stomach and the soup still turned out to be pungent with the strongest allium.
Not to worry. The flavour was rich, slightly tart and quite unlike anything you extract with a can opener. Rather than roasting the tomatoes, they are roughly chopped, stalks and all, and thrown into a pan with some sauteed garlic and olive oil and cooked for no longer than two minutes, until they just start to leech out some of their tart juices. This quick cook method retains that 'just picked' flavour of the tomatoes so it has a summery resonance (did you know that up until about a year ago, I could not eat raw tomatoes? That was until I tried some vine ripened ones. Standard Budget Supermarket tomatoes have tough skins, watery flesh and very little flavour. Those on the vine, whilst considerably more money, are definitely worth the added expense. I kept popping them in my mouth whilst chopping them up last night!).
At this point they are
blended up and then some of the Tappenade is stirred through to taste. A final flourish of a Chiffonade (that's thinly chopped to me and you) of fresh Basil Leaves and the soup is done.
If you were really pushed for time and/or ingredients, you could use ready bought Tappenade too. Belazu do a particularly good green olive version. You may need to salt the soup a little more heavily though.
I'm not going to write out the recipe in full for the soup because it is so simple but here is a quick rundown: 900g Vine Tomatoes, 2-6 Cloves Garlic (depending on taste) and 50ml Olive Oil. Sweat down the garlic in the warmed olive oil until fragrant, add the tomatoes which have been roughly chopped (I just quartered mine) and cook for two minutes more. Pour into a blender and process until smooth. Push through a conical seive into a clean pan, stir through some Tappenade and taste for seasoning. More salt and pepper? Finish with a final drizzle of Olive Oil and the shredded Basil Leaves (optional).
Paul was in charge of the Toasted Cheese Sandwiches. I didn't fancy his Processed Cheese Slices with Mortadella combo so he made me Mozzarella in Carozza - my favourite way to have cheese in bread. These are the round things surrounding my soup.
Paul makes his M.I.C. slightly differently to me. I just cut the cru
sts off and leave them square. He lays out two slices of bread, puts two circles of Mozzarella on one slice, places the other slice of bread on top and uses a cookie cutter to cut out a perfectly sealed circle of a sandwich. He then dips it in a mixture of milk and egg beaten together and fries it. It seems like a cheffy way of doing it but there's a method to his madness: Pauls Ad Hoc French Toast. What will resemble, to British readers, the leftover crusts from marmite sandwiches is in fact Maple Syrup drizzled all over the crusts from the M.I.C. He had also used up the milk and egg mix and a small nubbin of butter to fry the crusts in. As someone who still leaves the crusts on bread (and burger buns or rolls - I know, they're ALL crust), I couldn't quite face trying it myself, but Paul assures me that all they required was a touch of cinnamon in the egg/milk and a final flourish of Icing Sugar. As always, understated.
That was until I decided to make my own soups. It started some years ago when I first Paul and I made him a Wild Rice Soup. I was discussing this very first soup with Paul the other night and I came to the conclusion that it was a forerunner for my Risotto making frenzy of 2004, so thick and creamy it was, that it barely resembled soup.
After that, I have made many types of soup. It can be a quick supper or a slow simmered make-ahead meal. It can be restorative or comforting or perhaps both. It can be thick or thin, chunky or smooth, healthy or rich with cream.
I know what you’re thinking: “But she said after her Soup Week that she had sworn off soups for probably life.” Ahh, but I cannot resist the seductive lure of the bowl of soup.
Last night was no exception. Paul, who feels the same ways as I do about soups, and with perhaps more nostalgia because he connects Soup and a Sandwich to summers spent with his Dad, wanted Toasted Cheese Sandwiches and Soup for Supper. A nicely alliterative dish, I’m sure you’ll agree. Fortunately for him, I had already thought about making Tomato Soup for a cooking event called Jhiva for Ingredients. This is my first entry into the event, and slightly inauspicious as I am a day late so hopefully the host, My Workshop, will not be too harsh on me!
Jhiva is Sanscrit for desire, deep longing and taste. The word also represents the tongue and taste buds. Jhiva for Ingredients is a celebration of natural ingredients used in Indian Cooking. Our job is simply to do the ingredients justice in whatever way we can.
This months ingredient is the tomato in all its incarnations and the only problem with the humble tom is which recipe to make for there is surely a surfeit of tomato dishes.
I have never made Tomato Soup before, and I have never been a fan of Tinned Tomato Soup, finding it too sweet, too synthetic and the texture to be too thick. I like soups to have a little texture to them.
This particular recipe is borrowed from one of my favourite TV Chefs, Rick Stein. His food is always unpretentious and most importantly accessible to the home cook. There is nothing worse than finding a recipe that you simply must cook but you just don't have the skills or you can't get hold of the ingredients.
What makes this Tomato Soup a little different to others is that it doesn't rely on the tomatoes being roasted and it is seasoned - heavily - with a homemade Tappenade. This soup also contains no less than six cloves of garlic in addition to the 3 in the Tappenade!
Suffice it to say, I slashed the amount of garlic in both, thinking of our social status the next day, not to mention Pauls icky stomach and the soup still turned out to be pungent with the strongest allium.
Not to worry. The flavour was rich, slightly tart and quite unlike anything you extract with a can opener. Rather than roasting the tomatoes, they are roughly chopped, stalks and all, and thrown into a pan with some sauteed garlic and olive oil and cooked for no longer than two minutes, until they just start to leech out some of their tart juices. This quick cook method retains that 'just picked' flavour of the tomatoes so it has a summery resonance (did you know that up until about a year ago, I could not eat raw tomatoes? That was until I tried some vine ripened ones. Standard Budget Supermarket tomatoes have tough skins, watery flesh and very little flavour. Those on the vine, whilst considerably more money, are definitely worth the added expense. I kept popping them in my mouth whilst chopping them up last night!).
At this point they are
blended up and then some of the Tappenade is stirred through to taste. A final flourish of a Chiffonade (that's thinly chopped to me and you) of fresh Basil Leaves and the soup is done.If you were really pushed for time and/or ingredients, you could use ready bought Tappenade too. Belazu do a particularly good green olive version. You may need to salt the soup a little more heavily though.
I'm not going to write out the recipe in full for the soup because it is so simple but here is a quick rundown: 900g Vine Tomatoes, 2-6 Cloves Garlic (depending on taste) and 50ml Olive Oil. Sweat down the garlic in the warmed olive oil until fragrant, add the tomatoes which have been roughly chopped (I just quartered mine) and cook for two minutes more. Pour into a blender and process until smooth. Push through a conical seive into a clean pan, stir through some Tappenade and taste for seasoning. More salt and pepper? Finish with a final drizzle of Olive Oil and the shredded Basil Leaves (optional).
Paul was in charge of the Toasted Cheese Sandwiches. I didn't fancy his Processed Cheese Slices with Mortadella combo so he made me Mozzarella in Carozza - my favourite way to have cheese in bread. These are the round things surrounding my soup.
Paul makes his M.I.C. slightly differently to me. I just cut the cru
sts off and leave them square. He lays out two slices of bread, puts two circles of Mozzarella on one slice, places the other slice of bread on top and uses a cookie cutter to cut out a perfectly sealed circle of a sandwich. He then dips it in a mixture of milk and egg beaten together and fries it. It seems like a cheffy way of doing it but there's a method to his madness: Pauls Ad Hoc French Toast. What will resemble, to British readers, the leftover crusts from marmite sandwiches is in fact Maple Syrup drizzled all over the crusts from the M.I.C. He had also used up the milk and egg mix and a small nubbin of butter to fry the crusts in. As someone who still leaves the crusts on bread (and burger buns or rolls - I know, they're ALL crust), I couldn't quite face trying it myself, but Paul assures me that all they required was a touch of cinnamon in the egg/milk and a final flourish of Icing Sugar. As always, understated.The ingenuity of the man knows no bounds and it is because of Paul and his inventiveness that I continue cook and write every single day! Paul, without you, I'm nothing!
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