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Saturday, March 9, 2013

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.

36 comments:

  1. I love tomato and basil, just a classic comvination that works so brilliantly. I love what you did with that stamped on bread, haha! so cute! think if I were your daughter I would be chuffed to have this pretty looking meal :)

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    1. The things I do to my kids eat everything I make them :)

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  3. Happy Mother's Day to you!! :)
    Your bread stamp is super adorable hehe. Thanks for the recipe share! This soup looks fairly simple to make. Perhaps I should try cooking it for my mom. :)

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    1. Thank you dear! This is a really simple recipe, my mum asked me to make it for her AGAIN next week :) I would happily make it again.

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  4. Your daughter is so cute! I can understand why she gave it two thumbs up! Tomato and basil soup is the best and yours looks delicious! Can't wait for summer so I can make some too.

    Nazneen @coffeeandcrumpets.com

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    1. Thanks for dropping by Nazneen :) We're lucky we can get nice tomatoes almsot all year round here. :)

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  5. super cute 'I love mum' bread stamp!! The soup looks delectable and like I keep saying its so nice to see your kids enjoy a healthy meal than the junk available nowadays!! Great job Mommy!!

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    1. Yeah we try to avoid giving them junk, but sometimes we do as a treat, but as long as they eat healthy that's good enough for me :)

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  6. Not a fan of tomato. I would prefer mushroom...or pumpkin.

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    1. The onion and potatoes mellow down the tanginess of the tomato, so it's not too sour. Just nice for us :)

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  7. Ooo I have a bit of a love hate relationship with tomatoes too, partly because of memories of sourish tomato ketchup while growing up and sour tomato soups and bland tomatoes. But i do love the sweet and fresh and juicy ones now :D happy mothering day! =)

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    1. In general, we love cherry tomatoes but the big ones can sometimes be a bit tart. Was happy my daughter ate a whole big bowl!

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  8. Hi Yen,
    I love tomato soup and this looks delicious!
    Two Mother's Day celebration for you? So, you have double presents? How lucky! :)

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  9. Your hubby is very thoughtful , my hubby will never buy me this kind of cute things..It is nice to celebrate Mother's Day with this fresh and yummy tomato soup , so every mom also look pretty and healthy !

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    1. The last time he also bought the Hello Kitty cookie stamp for me. He knows I like all these cute stuff! Haha. :P (easily pleased)

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  10. Happy Mother's Day! I love tomatoes. Sometime I will just buy one packet of cheery tomato to put in office as a snack. :D

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  11. You kids should luv you coz ur such a terrific mum! :D

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  12. HI Yen! I'm sure the kids enjoy your soup and love! Happy Mummy's Day! Best!

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    1. As a parent, I'm sure you can understand the delight when kids eat the food u cook for them, right?

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  13. Hi Yen,

    Your "I love mum" toast stamp is so cool! I have seen the "I love you" ones but never seen yours. Your hubby sure know how to buy great gifts. Mine is pretty hopeless... LOL! I'm the one that buy everything for them which is good because I like shopping :D

    Your tomato soup made with fresh Cameron Highland tomatoes looks wonderful... My son refuses everything cooked with tomatoes but only eat fresh tomatoes and tomato ketchup... Strange kid :p

    Zoe

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    1. Usually I am the one who does all the shopping too, but he is pretty good at buying me knick knacks such as this :)

      My daughter usually likes cherry tomatoes and ketchup only, so I was surprised she ate a whole bowl of this!

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  14. Yen, you untunglah, had 2 celebrations each year! The I love mum stamp is surely a nice gift to mummies & must make this tomato soup extra delicious! Ethan likes asian soup better than western soup, sigh sigh, otherwise can cook this in winter! Love your idea to go with basil!

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    1. My kids also eat more Chinese soup than Eastern also (haha everyday they will drink chinese soup compared to maybe once a week for Western).

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  15. Been looking for this recipe which is easy to follow.
    THANK U VERY MUCH!

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  16. Hi Yen,

    Tomato soup sounds so comfort and warm to have with a piece of 'I love you mum' toast on Mother's Day.
    My sil is coming to visit me from UK. I think i can get her to check out this stamp from 'Sainsbury' for me:p
    Thanks for sharing such lovely tomato soup:D
    mui

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    1. Ooo mui mui, ask your SIL to find it now. Cos usually they wont sell it after Mother's Day.

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  17. The bread stamp is so cute... Love a bowl of warm tomato soup. Very comforting. I am sure your mum must be so happy.

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    1. Haha my mum is always happy when I cook for her. I've been cooking her Delia's recipes almost every day and meal.

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  18. It's so hard to find good tomatoes here, most of them are so bland. So Cameron ones are decent? Finally cooked a Delia Smith recipe, will post soon!

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    1. Kelly, you have to choose the really red and ripe ones. Jusco's one usually looks nicer. Or they have lots of other more "expensive" tomatoes available...such as plum tomatoes etc.

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  19. Sam love eat the tomatoes raw but not sure whether she like the soup since she's not very fond of drinking soup o.O

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Please drop any comments or questions you may have here. Thank you so much for reading!