Fall into Soup

Roasted Cherry Tomato Soup

It's Fall in Ontario and the weather has shifted to cold and grey days where all you want to do is curl up with a hot bowl of soup and watch all the new shows on TV.  Grab those sweaters, throws and curl up on the couch with this bowl of Roasted Cherry Tomato Soup. 

I added a boost of flavour using new Herbamare Bouillon Cubes provided by A. Vogel Canada.  

I created this quick recipe for the Herbamare Broth Challenge and you can follow along fellow food bloggers recipes on social media using the hashtag #howdoyouherbamare

RECIPE

1/2 pint cherry tomatoes

2 roma tomatoes

1 clove garlic

1 tsp dried basil

1 tbsp. olive oil

1 tbsp tomato paste

1 Herbamare® Bouillon Cube

4 cups of water

salt and pepper

smoked salt (optional)

Flat leaf parsley sprigs for garnish

Packaged Garlic croutons or make your own

DIRECTIONS

Using a cookie sheet spread the washed cherry tomatoes on a parchment lined sheet.  Cut the roma tomatoes into quarters and add to the pan.  Pour the olive oil over the tomatoes and crush the garlic and add it to the tomatoes.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Add a pinch of smoked salt if you have some or you can also add smoked paprika.   Mix the tomatoes to coat everything and then roast in the oven at 400ºF until they are soft and just starting to char about 20 minutes or so depending on your oven.  When done remove and blend with a stick blender or you can add it to a blender.  I used a stick blender.  

In a separate saucepan/pot add the 4 cups of water and the Herbamare bouillon cube, tomato paste and bring to a boil.  Add the pureed tomato mixture and dried basil and/or fresh parsley and continue to simmer on medium for about 15 minutes.

Pour into a serving bowl and top with croutons and parsley sprig.  You can also grate parmesan cheese on top or add sour cream if you like.  Serves 2-4

Grab a spoon and hit the couch and turn on your favourite TV show and enjoy!

Don't forget to share the recipe with your friends and family if you like it.  And take a selfie with your soup and hashtag #howdoyouherbamare if you like it.

For more info about other A. Vogel Canada products go to their website: http://www.avogel.ca

*Disclaimer:  Herbamare samples were provided for this recipe but the recipe is my own and all other ingredients were purchased by me and the opinions are my own.  Photos are also taken by me.

Fall Recharge Soup

Fall Green Recharge Soup

I am not a big soup lover, probably because when i was a kid and i wasn't feeling well my mom would always make chicken soup or some sort of soup.  So I suppose I equate soup with feeling sick and it being like a natural medicine.   The more I learn about food the more I realize that there is a lot of truth to the fact that food can be medicine.   After spending the past 11 days running around at the Toronto International Film Festival and not eating or sleeping right I was feeling very depleted.   I decided to make yesterday a recharge day to rest and refuel for the week.   In my quest to recharge I made a detox recharge everything in it big pot of soup.   I wanted to use as many different vegetables as I thought would work together to make a healthy and tasty soup.  I used some frozen Cookin Greens Athlete's Mix to save some time and get more healthy greens into the soup without the chopping.

Ingredients:

1/2 chopped cooking onion

1 whole red chili

1 large garlic clove

1 tbsp. tomato paste

1/4 cup red lentils

1/2 cup chopped cabbage

2 carrots cut into 1/4 inch slices

2 tbsps tomato sauce or chopped tomatoes

1 cup Cookin Greens Athlete's Mix (frozen)

1 tsp chili flakes

1 tsp red wine vinegar

1 tsp parsley

1 cooked and sliced Andouille or Chorizo sausage (optional)

2 small white potatoes chopped into chunks

1 tsp smoked paprika

1 tbsp Old Bay Seasoning

Shrimp shells

Salt and Pepper to taste

3 cups of water 

Directions

I started with some shrimp shells that I had saved to make a fish stock and put them into a large Dutch Oven pot filled with water and salt and at a rolling boil I put the shrimp shells in and boiled for about 15 minutes with Old Bay Seasoning.  Once the shrimp has released the flavour from the shells you can remove the shells and start adding the rest of the ingredients.  Add the potatoes, onions, cabbage and carrots and cook about 15 minutes.  Add the lentils, tomato paste, garlic, chilli's, tomato sauce, smoked paprika and salt and pepper.   Cook for about 10 minutes and then add the parsley and cooked Sausage and red wine vinegar and the Cookin Greens.  Cook for another 15 minutes to release the flavour and defrost the Cookin Greens.    Cook long enough to blend all the flavours and keep the greens still bright.    The whole cooking time should take about an hour but you can cook it more or less depending on how much you want to develop the flavours.  I find that layering the flavours and adding the ingredients based on what takes the longest to cook is the best way to make sure it all blends together well and retains the best flavours.

Serve it with a great piece of french bread and you have a filling meal.

It will yield about 6 servings.

This soup freezes well and is great for those cold winter nights when you are out all day and want something to warm you up quick.

This soup is a great soup to get your protein and greens and give your body a great kickstart to a bit of detoxing.   You can omit the Andouille sausage and use vegetable stock if you want to make it vegetarian but the shrimp stock and sausage adds a lot of cajun flavour that boosts the whole flavour of the soup.