I’m always telling everybody at every opportunity that I’m not a salad or soup lover. Though, eating raw vegetables is not something I enjoy. Soups are just not favourite food. The other day, a friend and I chatting about how growing older seemed connected to changed food choices. She agreed that the older we got the more willing we seemed to try foods on our “don’t like” lists. That seems the case with this Roasted Tomato Soup With Basil Cream.
I still do not like aubergine/ eggplant very much but can take in small doses if cooked in a certain way. Cooked salads, pasta salads and raw salads with fruit and nuts are acceptable. And a couple of weeks back, I actually felt like having soup!
It could have been because I wasn’t feeling to well. I think I am slowly developing a taste for certain soups. This time I had caught a bad respiratory infection. All I wanted to something warm to drink, at regular intervals, to sooth my irritated throat. I love tea but there is only so much tea that one can drink in a day, so I needed something else. A cousin suggested rum (and coke) but I don’t drink alcohol. So the other option that came to mind was soup.
The vegetables in my fridge were down to a minimume. The vegetable bin yielded some tomatoes, carrots and red bell pepper. So that decided what was going into my soup. A search on the ever resourceful net led me to this recipe which I adapted to my taste. This isn’t really a soup which one can throw together at one’s whim. The vegetables need to oven roasted, but it is one which cooks up without too much effort.
I made it in slightly larger quantities, refrigerated it to warm up whenever I wanted some hot soup. If you plan to do this, it would be better to leave out the milk and substitute it with more stock (or water). This thick soup is a nice balance of very slightly sweet and spicy flavours with a faint tang from the orange juice.
Basil Cream – I made the above soup to sooth an irritated throat. You can to serve it as part of a regular meal and also make a Basil Cream to serve with it. All this cream needs is some fresh basil and some cream. The Basil Cream really does add that “special” something to the soup. The leftover Basil Cream can be refrigerate for a couple of days. It makes an excellent dip as well.
There used to be a time, when I used to have not just green thumbs but green fingers too. In the past couple of years though, I have had a tough time just trying to get a few potted herbs growing.
I plant the seeds or cuttings, they sprout a few leaves only to invariably die on me. It looks like the green is creeping back into my thumbs again. I have, for the first time in ages, managed to grow some semblance of an herb garden. Right now, my herb garden consists of only 3 types of basil, some mint and curry leaves but it’s a beginning.
Roasted Tomato And Carrot Soup With Basil Cream (GF)
Ingredients
For the Soup :
- 2 onions medium
- 8 to 10 tomatoes medium
- 5 carrots big
- 1 red bell pepper big (capsicum)
- 1 cup orange juice , sweetened
- 1 cup milk
- 11/2 tbsps olive oil
- 1/2 tsp garlic paste
- 1 1/2 tsps cumin powder
- 1 tsp garam masala
- 1/2 tsp chilli flakes (adjust to taste)
- 1 1/2 to 2 cups vegetable stock (or water)
- to taste salt
For the Basil Cream :
- 200 ml cream (I used 25% fat)
- 15 to 20 basil fresh leaves
- 1/4 tsp salt
Instructions
- For the soup start by preparing the vegetables for roasting. Quarter the onions, cut the carrots into 1/2u201d rounds, the bell pepper into large pieces and put them all together. Quarter the tomatoes and remove the seeds and pulp. This ensures that there isnu2019t too much liquid when the tomatoes are roasting.
- Lightly oil two baking sheets. Add about 1/2 tbsp oil (out of the 1 tbsp) each to both the chopped tomatoes and to the other vegetables. Toss them so they are well coated with the oil. Now spread the tomatoes out on one baking sheet and the other vegetables on the other, ensuring they are in a single layer.
- Bake them at 200C (400F) for about 45 to 50 minutes or till the vegetables are well roasted. Let them cool and then purxe9e the roasted vegetables in the blender, adding the orange juice, till smooth. Then add the milk and blend till well mixed.
- In a large saucepan, heat the remaining 1/2 tbsp oil and sautxe9 the garlic paste in it. Turn down the heat and then add the cumin powder and garam masala. Do not allow it to burn.
- Now add the purxe9ed vegetables. Mix well and add as much of the vegetable stock as needed to thin the soup to required consistency. Add salt and chili flakes to taste, bring the soup to a boil and then turn down the heat. Allow the soup to simmer for about 5 to 10 minutes.
- Take the soup off the heat and serve warm with the basil cream (recipe below).
- For the Basil Cream, Put the cream in a small pan and slowly bring to a boil. Add the salt and basil leaves, keep stirring and cook till the basil leaves wilt. This should take under 10 seconds.
- Allow the mixture to cool for about 10 minutes and then purxe9e it in a blender till smooth. Pour the cream back into the pan and warm slightly just before serving.
Jamie says
Basil cream? Wow!!! Trying that one! And I just had my first bowl of hot soup this season and love it! I love your carrot soup! And you prove that the great thing about soup is that one can often make something so delicious out of what is left in the veg drawer of the fridge and a few herbs or spices.
Satya says
both the recipes r awesome …love the soup ,can feel the taste of roasted tomatos..yummy..thanks for basil cream recipe too Satyahttp://www.superyummyrecipes.com
Veena says
Looks lovely! Any of the seeds sprouting, the ones I brought over?
Xiaolu @ 6 Bittersweets says
I love carrot soup :). This one looks delicious and with such pretty swirls.
Asha @ FSK says
3 types of basil and mint.. Aparna, I am envious.. I have a black thumb :(( Everything living that I bring home dies :(( very disturbing!!! sighhI don’t like salads.. as we wud say can’t ghaas-poos 😀 But soups are ok depending on mood :DTake care and hope u feel better soon
Curry Leaf says
I have a black thumb Aparna :(. Love soups esp tomato and basil.Basil cream is a must try.
Prerna@IndianSimmer says
OMG! I was in this conference a few days back and one of the chefs made basil whipped cream to top macerated fruits and IT WAS SO DARN TASTY! Thanks for sharing the recipe. I love you so much because you post all the recipes perfect for my daughter! Now I don’t have to make two meals 🙂
Cody says
I just made roasted tomato soup last night. A creamy tomato soup or a corn chowder is pretty much where I draw the line on soup… nothing else appeals.Salad, though, I love. I prefer raw veggies to cooked.
Hari Chandana says
Woww.. very new to me.. looks awesome and tempting dear !!
Torviewtoronto says
lovely presentationlooks delicious
Priya (Yallapantula) Mitharwal says
wow, what a nice and rich./creamy color dear. Beautifully presented.
Srimathi says
Nice to see your green fingers in action. I grow curry leaves here because it is like gold so expensive. Good job in growing all the herbs. The tomato soup looks picture perfect.
BangaloreBaker says
This is something I might like a lot minus the basil cream. If I make it, I will have to eat it by myself (noone likes basil in my place but me) Nice pictures as usual.
San says
That’s a wise combo n the pictures are so appealing ,atleast for that i will try that soup coz soups are not my cup of tea .Yep i could know itz lil crazy though (not drinking soup) Refreshing soup aparna.
Madhuli says
Wow..the soup looks stunningly delicious!I love soups so this will be tried immediately! Love the Basil cream ..getting loads of basil now and so very happy to see the cream…thanks
Jayashree says
The soup looks very appetising….i like the swirls of cream on top.
Vidhya says
soup looks so refreshing Aparna.
Priya Suresh says
Feel like grabbing that bowl of warm and tempting soup, beautiful looking basil cream,thanks for sharing..
lata raja says
I am longing to take that bowl of soup off your table and place it right here and now!I have lot of basil in the garden as at this instant. So am preparing the cream sometime soon. Does it pair with any soup?
MeetaK says
just right for this weather!
Tasty Eats At Home says
This sounds divine. I am a big lover of soup. And that basil cream? Genius!
Miri says
I love soups – but yes I know what you mean about growing older and tastes changing….I used to dislike rasam for a long time. But it has now become comfort food – so also adai and cabbage…I have tried this oven roasted soup and the roasting truly enhances the flavour to no end. The basil cream is something new and looks exotic. I had a beautiful basil plant for 6 months and then it died in this heat 🙁
Sarah says
I completely agree with you about salad. I am a vegetarian too and salad always makes me wonder why I’m eating raw vegetables when they’d taste even better roasted or in a lasagne or in stir fry or curry or something. But soup is another story. Last winter my mom and I made a big batch of soup almost every weekend and ate it throughout the week. This looks delicious, and I love the interesting flavors–orange juice and garam masala is such a cool combination! I can’t wait to try it.
Junglefrog says
I actually love salads and I love soups too.. 🙂 The good kind that is and this appears to have all the right flavors! It is true though that our tastes seem to change when we grow older. Although I’ve always been someone who likes just about everything I find that I tend to eat more of certain foods.In any case; this is a lovely soup and that basil cream sounds very intriguing!
Aparna says
Thanks for the lovely comments.Wow is what I also said with the first taste of the basil cream, Jamie.No Veena. No success so far. 🙁 Shall give those seeds one last chance this weekend.Oh dear! Ghaas-poos describes it perfectly, Asha. Hee……….Prerna, thanks for that suggestion. I can see the basil cream being perfect with fresh fruit.Srimathi, as you know, curry leaves are everywhere here, but there’s always something special about those that one grows. :)Madhuli, good thing to use your basil in. :)Lata, I don’t think it will pair with all soups, but should work well where basil would work like tomato soup. The original recipe pairs it with asparagus soup. I used much less basil than in the original recipe because we prefer a hint of basil rather than be over powered by it. This cream also works well as a spread over bread; think it would be good to use it with something like bruschetta or even pasta perhaps.Miri, I still dislike rasam though have always liked cabbage. :)I know how you feel about your plant ‘cos I’ve been there.Sarah, good to know there are quite a few salad non-lovers out there. 🙂
Sweet Artichoke says
Herbs in the pots are looking lovely! and the soup sounds delicious and full of flavours! I love soups 🙂
Apu says
Lovely soup!! Good to see you growing some of your own herbs finally!!
Kathryn says
I love this time of year- it’s the perfect soup weather! I recently made tortellini sausage soup, but your soup looks WAY better!
Lola Manoharan says
Hi,
I am not sure why this happens but often some of the words in the recipes in this website is a garbled mix of alphabets and figures. For example, in instruction 3, the word ‘puree’ appears like this – purxe9e! Everywhere in this recipe, ‘puree’ is garbled! Mystified!
Aparna Balasubramanian says
I’m sorry that this has you mystified and inconvenienced.
It is a formatting problem that happened when my blog was moved from a particular hosting service to another. As I have a large number of recipes, going in and manually correcting everything is taking a bit of time.
I’m working on it and everything should be alright in a couple of months.