tomato soup

scoop on soup

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Even though Sweden still isn’t on lockdown, I am not keen to exit my self-imposed isolation. This means I end up cooking with what I have, and right now, soup is the only thing I feel like eating anyway.

Yet I’m out of many of the ingredients I most love in soup… so it’s been experimentation time. I wanted something tomato-based – maybe just a pure tomato or tomato garlic soup. But I also felt like having something more substantial. I couldn’t find any recipes online that gave me quite what I wanted. But here we are… an experimental, slightly spicy tomato chickpea coconut soup.

Experimental tomato chickpea coconut soup
1 medium onion, chopped and sauteed
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
a pinch of sugar
1 tin (15 ounces or so) of crushed tomatoes or equivalent chopped, peeled fresh tomatoes
1 tin (15 ounces or so) of drained, rinsed chickpeas
1 cup coconut milk
1 1/2 cups water (here you could add bouillon of some sort if you want more flavor; I used a half teaspoon of some browned shallot flavored liquid base/bouillon)
salt and pepper to taste

Saute onion; add garlic once onions are translucent. After 20 or 30 seconds of stirring, add cayenne, then vinegar, tomatoes and sugar. Stir.

Add chickpeas and coconut milk. Stir. Bring to simmer. Add water.

Cover and simmer about 30 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool down before blending with an immersion blender.

Once finished, taste it to see if it’s spiced and seasoned properly. Add salt, pepper, more coconut milk, whole chickpeas (or whatever you want). Drizzle with high quality olive oil when serving.

In the photo I was just going to serve the plain soup but added some wilted spinach on top at the end. That wasn’t too bad.

I suspect this will taste better, as do many things, on the second day.

Roasted tomato & garlic soup

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With a whole lot of tomatoes and garlic on my hands, and a persistent hankering for soup, I decided to wing it and make a roasted tomato with roasted garlic soup.

Here’s about how I did it:

12-15 medium Roma tomatoes (tops sliced off; tomatoes halved widthwise)
1 full head of garlic (top sliced off)
2-3 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon basil (I would skip this if you have fresh basil you can use later; I did not have any on hand)
1 large red onion, diced
1 cup vegetable stock

Preheat oven to 200C. Place the cut tomatoes in a pan lined with baking paper or foil, drizzle tomatoes with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and the herbs. Roast about 35 minutes (or until the skins easily peel away). You can also de-seed the tomatoes when done, if desired. I did not bother.

At the same time, drizzle olive oil over your head of garlic, wrap in foil and also roast for 35 minutes.

Remove the tomato skins (and seeds if desired) and set the roasted goods aside.

In a medium pan, saute your diced onion in a tablespoon of olive oil (I did this, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes). Add the tomatoes and garlic, stir and then add the vegetable stock – here you can decide how much liquid you need. You might not want the full cup. Bring to boil, simmer for a while. When ready, blend.

To serve, I added a tiny splash of coconut milk and a dot of pesto to the top (lacking fresh basil as I was).

And it was delicious!