Creamy tomato soup

I had some chicken broth left over from yesterday, not a great deal. Just under a litre, I reckon. I also had a little of yesterday’s cooked rice left. In my head, the two naturally added up to tomato soup. At first I thought I’d make the classic kind, and in 3 minutes flat. Two tablespoons of tomato purée, give it a stir, bring it to the boil, soup’s ready. But…

Well, but my broth still had plenty of vegetables in it (my daughter likes her broth absolutely plain. I have to strain it through a sieve so nothing whatsoever lands in her bowl, because she immediately starts fishing things out, and if I let her, lunch would take two hours instead of one). It would be a shame to waste those vegetables, and the usual tomato soup tends to come without them.

Oh well, I’ll spend a few more minutes and make myself a smooth tomato soup. Why not? Besides, I’d given spicy food a rest over the weekend, so I’ll spice it up something wicked. Why not? I’m on my own, so I’m allowed. And it actually turned out to be a pretty decent soup. Only, since I also had yesterday’s spaghetti sauce left over, today I’m practically a tomato myself 🙂

At a glance:

Prep time: 15 minutes

Serves: 2–3 people (if, like me, you use about 0.8 litres of yesterday’s broth)

How many calories? It’s fine

Ingredients for a velvety tomato soup (slightly spicy):

• chicken broth base (from this recipe for chicken broth)
• one large tomato (peeled)
• two tablespoons of tomato purée
• ground black pepper
• herbes de Provence
• cayenne pepper
• cream for soup
• fresh parsley

The recipe (a breeze if you’ve got yesterday’s broth):

I had ready-made broth as my base, so this was a doddle. If you haven’t got any, easy: make some. Make sure there are some vegetables in it, they’ll give the soup a more interesting flavour (whatever that means). I had two medium carrots, half a small celeriac, a piece of parsley root, an onion and a piece of leek left in mine.

I reheat my broth over a low “flame”. Meanwhile I scald a large tomato and slip off the skin. When the broth comes to the boil, I chop the tomato finely and throw it all in, seeds and all. I cook it for a few minutes and season to taste with black pepper, cayenne and herbes de Provence. I let it cook a little longer and add two tablespoons of tomato purée.

I give it a good stir to blend in the purée and cook it for another minute or so. Off the “heat”, let it cool a little, then blend everything in the pan until velvety smooth. If it’s too thick, I add a little water and heat it up again. I serve it with a little rice (you can probably do without, I just happened to have some from yesterday) and a dollop of cream. I garnish it rather inelegantly with fresh green parsley. Enjoy!