Recipe: Fresh tomato soup with basil (Delia Smith)

Mother's Day in UK is celebrated at the same time as Mothering Sunday (a Christian holiday) on the 4th Sunday in Lent to honour mothers and gift them with presents. This year, it falls on 10th March. Malaysians celebrate Mother's Day at a later date in May, at the same time as US and the rest of the world, however I do get to celebrate on both dates, thanks to Hubby's origins. All the better for me :)

Fresh tomato soup with basil 

Two years ago, Hubby bought this cute "I ♥ Mum" bread stamp from the UK (from Sainsbury's) and every Mother's Day, the kids will make me breakfast toast using this stamp. If you can find this novelty stamp in the shops, do get it and serve it with this fresh tomato soup with basil - it will surely put a smile on your mother or wives' face ;)

This simple fresh tomato soup is bursting with freshness and is really quite easy to make, but your effort will definitely be appreciated. Light, tasty and healthy, this will be good for a light lunch or as a starter before your main meal.

For this soup, I used ripe local Cameron Highlands tomatoes. Delia did not mention whether to use vegetable or chicken stock for this, I went for a light chicken stock but by all means, use vegetable stock for a vegetarian soup. The chicken stock is made by boiling chicken carcass with water for about 30 minutes. Alternatively, if you want to save time, you can use a good quality store-bought chicken or vegetable stock or even cubes, lots of low-sodium ones available nowadays.

Other than the first 10 minutes of softening the onions and potatoes, you do not need to stand around and watch this soup - just let it simmer and come back when it's ready. To finish off the soup, I roughly pureed it using a hand blender and then garnish with a swirl of cream and fresh basil. The recipe only calls for 2 teaspoons of fresh basil, but you can be a little more generous with it if you like, as it goes really well with the tomatoes. My mum who loves cheese, added some freshly grated Parmesan over her soup.

Homemade goodness

The biggest surprise came when Baby C finished a whole portion. Baby C has a love-hate relationship with tomatoes. This time, she really enjoyed this, and it seems that it wasn't just the mums who liked the novelty toast. :)

Two thumbs up from Baby C

A soup fit for princesses too :)

Finally, a very Happy Mother's Day to all celebrating. This post is dedicated to my mother-in-law, hope you have a wonderful day :)


Fresh tomato soup with basil
Recipe adapted from Delia Smith's Complete Cookery Course
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 35-40 minutes (+30 mins for making stock)
Serves 4 as starter or light lunch

Ingredients
600g ripe tomatoes, quartered with skin on
1 medium onion, chopped small
1 medium potato, chopped small
1 1/2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
275ml vegetable or light chicken stock
1 clove garlic, crushed
2 tsp chopped fresh sweet basil, to garnish
1 tsp whipping  or double cream, to garnish
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1. To make a light chicken stock, simply place about 500ml water and 1/2 chicken carcass (or chicken breast if you prefer) into a pot and bring to the boil. Once boiling, simmer over low heat for 30 minutes. Skim off scum or any fat. You only need 275ml stock for this recipe, reserve remaining stock for other uses.

Large Cameron Highlands tomatoes

2. In a separate pot, heat oil over medium heat and add the onion and potato. Cook for 2 minutes, then lower to low heat and soften them slowly without browning. Stir every few minutes, this will take about 10 minutes.

3. Add the tomatoes and cook for a minute. Pour the stock in over the tomatoes, stir, season with salt and pepper and add the garlic. Cover and allow to simmer for 25 minutes.

4. When the soup is ready, pass the whole lot through a sieve to extract the skin and pips. (I skipped this step, instead I used a hand blender to roughly puree the soup) Taste to check the seasoning.

5. Serve immediately with some crusty French bread or regular toast. Garnish with fresh basil and a swirl of cream. If you like, this soup can also be served ice cold.

Note: If you cannot get fresh basil, you can use 1 tsp of dried basil. Add this in Step 3 at the same time as the tomatoes.

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I am submitting this to the "Cook Like Delia Smith" bloghop which I am co-hosting with Zoe of Bake for Happy Kids and Mich of Piece of Cake. To join, simply cook or bake any recipe from any Delia Smith websites or cookbooks and blog hop with us for the whole month of March 2013.

Your post must be a current post i.e. posted in March 2013 - please do not link older posts.Please mention Cook like a Star in your post and link back to Zoe of Bake for Happy Kids, Mich of Piece of Cake and Baby Sumo of Eat your heart out.

You can get the HTML code here: get the InLinkz code (Click on the link, copy and paste the HTML code into your blog post where you want the blog hop list to appear. Make sure you are in HTML mode when you paste in the code)

Happy cooking! Do check out the other bloggers recipe below:

I am also submitting this to my friend mui mui's Little Thumbs Up "Tomato" event.

*This recipe was featured on Fabulous Food Blog recipes FB page on 8 May 2013.