It´s still soup season in my eyes, and this Tomato and Basil Soup is perfect to warm you up for lunch on a cold February afternoon! It´s extremely easy to make, vegan, tastes great and is fantastic served alongside some crusty (homemade bread). My easy Overnight Twist Bread flavoured with Sundried and Rosemary is a fantastic accompaniment with it, so why not give that a go, too!
How to make this Tomato and Basil Soup
My Tomato and Basil soup is really easy to make any only requires a few basic store cupboard ingredients! The base consists of onion, carrot, chilli and garlic and the stalks of the basil. These add great flavour, so definitively add them and don´t throw anything away! The basil leaves are chopped and added at the end so that they retain their vibrant green colour.
I then add a generous amount of tomato purée before adding a tin of plum tomatoes and some vegetable stock (make sure to use vegan stock cubes if you are wanting to keep it plant-based). You can also use chopped tomatoes, but I once heard Jamie Oliver saying that the plum tomatoes have more flavour… So that´s the only reason why I opted to use those over the chopped version. Simply break the tomatoes apart using a wooden spoon once you have added them to the pot, before rinsing the tin with some of the stock and pouring all of it into the pot. The soup is then simmered for 30-40 minutes for the vegetables to cook and to allow the flavours to develop nicely! I then purée the tomato soup until completely smooth, before stirring in the chopped basil.
More Soup Recipes
I absolutely love soup – in fact, I have it for lunch almost every single day! It´s the perfect solution for me, as I also enjoy making homemade bread which goes perfectly with a big bowl of soup! My Sundried Tomato and Rosemary Twist Bread or Crusty Sourdough Loaf go particularly well with this Tomato and Basil Soup, so why not give those recipes a go, too? For more of my favourite soup recipes, check out the links below:
- Grandma´s Thick Vegetable Soup
- Roasted Cauliflower and Cheese Soup
- Lentil, Carrot and Ginger Soup
- Red Lentil Soup
- Potato and Leek Soup
- Yellow Split Pea Soup
- Roasted Pumpkin Soup
Homemade Tomato and Basil Soup | Vegan, Student-friendly
Recipe
Ingredients (serves 3):
- A little olive oil
- 1 onion, roughly chopped
- 1 large carrot, peeled and sliced
- ½ red chilli, sliced
- 3 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped
- Small bunch fresh basil
- 2 tbsp tomato purée
- 400g tin plum tomatoes (or chopped tomatoes)
- 2 vegetable stock cubes
- Black pepper, to season
Method:
- Heat the oil in a pot over a medium heat. Add the onions, cover with a lid and sweat over a low heat for a few minutes until soft and translucent, stirring occasionally.
- Add the chopped carrot, chilli, garlic and stalks of the basil leaves to the pot. Squeeze and stir in roughly 2 tbsp tomato purée and cook out for 1-2 minutes.
- In the meantime, dissolve the vegetable stock cubes in 750ml of boiling water.
- Pour the tin of tomatoes and stock over the vegetables and use a wooden spoon to break up the tomatoes slightly. Bring to a simmer and leave the soup to cook for about 30-40 minutes.
- Use a hand blender to purée the soup until smooth. Stir in the remaining chopped basil and season the soup with black pepper and any additional salt or chilli flakes if necessary.
