Roast Tomato and Capsicum Soup, Oh My

Oh my god, you guys! Welcome to soup week. Or, Week O' Soup, as I think of it.

It seems right to have our first themed week dedicated to soup. Who doesn’t love it? If you're rocking the student lifestyle, it’s perfect for either entertaining, or feeding you for a week, whichever you prefer. And it’s so adaptable – get some delicious base ingredients, and play around with methods, herbs and spices and you can get fantastic variations out of one simple recipe.

Which is what I did with the following – craving something with tomato and capsicum one chilly winter evening I got on my internet machine and hunted up a recipe. Souvlaki for the Soul didn’t disappoint with his Roast Capsicum and Tomato Soup. The perfect accompaniment to a winter night on the couch with friends indulging in the Jurassic Park trilogy.

The first time I made it was to the letter, with a sweet, rich tomato soup as end product. The second time I made it I adjusted to what was in my cupboard, substituting fresh flat leaf parsley for basil, paprika for chili, and using fennel and oregano to season the roasting tomatoes instead of balsamic vinegar. I ended up with a lovely robust winter soup, with vegetable stock flavours that really brought out the potato and capsicum, and a delightful warm red colour that really brought out the carnage in Jurassic Park 2.

Tomato and Capsicum Soup
Original recipe here.

What You Will Need

• 8 roma tomatoes, halved lengthways

• 2 large red capsicums

• 1 large or 2 medium desiree or red rascal potatoes

• 2 cloves of garlic

• Olive oil

• 2 tsp Fennel seeds

• 1/2 cup fresh flat leaf parsley

• 1 generous tbsp ground paprika

• A few good shakes dried oregano
  

• 2 cups vegetable stock
  

• Good ole salt and pepper
  

What You Will Need to Do

• Preheat your oven to 160 degrees C

• Chop capsicum into pieces that sit relatively flat on a baking tray.

• Halve your tomatoes and place face down, with capsicum, on an oiled baking tray.

• Drizzle with oil, minced garlic, fennel seeds, dried oregano and salt and pepper.

• Place in oven, set timer for at least 45 minutes.

• If you have extra time, my suggestion is the longer the better!

Your veggies should look something like this going into the oven (if you mood lit them, like I apparently did) :

And something like this coming out:


Mmmm, wrinkly.

• About ten or fifteen minutes before the tomato and capsicum is done, cube the potato and fry in a soup pot, with a little bit of salt, pepper, paprika, and olive oil.

• When potato is tender add tomato paste, and fry for a further minute.

• Add the fresh parsley, roasted tomato and capsicum, stir together.

• Add stock and bring to the boil.

• Blend it to hell with a bamix, or until smooth.

• Salt and pepper to taste.
  

You soup should look something like this before you blend it:

And something like this, after:

Speaking of things from the '90s that make me happy (dinosaurs on the big screen, mostly!) if you've been meaning to get into Pavement, now is the time:

We Dance - from Wowee Zowee
Embassy Row - from Brighten the Corners
Billie - from Terror Twilight