please post your yummiest soups recipes!

[chrispackhamslovebunny]

its getting cold and im rubbish with food most of the time - some nights i do a full jamies 30 minute meal and love it but other times if its just me and the kids who wont eat anything "fancy" i end up cooking them rubbish and grabbing a bowl of cereal.
i realise thats not great and someone today suggested soups. and i thought "of course!" soups!"
i could freeze them.
i could take them to work.
the kids love soup and they are healthy and nutritional.

so the only snag is i havent a clue where to start!
please can you post your yummiest recipes (nothing too taxing though!) for me to whip up some nutritious and delicious soups?

ive only got a hand blender but it does the job.

ta in advance!

if you click on the the 'watch' tab at the bottom/top of the thread it will stay in your 'threads i'm watching' untill you remove it.

I tried this soup in a cafe once, and fell in ove with it, so tried to recreate it at home ...

Butternut squash with red pepper & sweetcorn

1 whole butternut squash, halved & deseeded
1 handful chopped sage
1 onion finely diced
1 garlic clove thinly sliced
Half red pepper, finely chopped
2 handfuls frozen sweetcorn
500 ml vegetable stock

Drizzle a small amount of olive oil on the BNS and roast in the oven for about half an hour. Remove from oven, let cool a bit and then roughly chop. Sweat the onion & garlic in a little olive oil. Add the BNS, stir and then add the sage. Pourin the stock and simmer for 20 mins. Add the red pepper & sweetcorn, season and simmer for anouther 5 minutes. Then its ready to serve!

Delia's slow cooked root veg soup is THE best!!

I rarely follow a soup recipe just chuck in whatever I have got in the fridge! Sweet potatoes are a brilliant soup staple and if you add a bit of chilli to anything it normally works.

On and here's a good one:
Roast onions tomatoes peppers and sweet potatoes fir about half an hour. Meanwhile cook some lentls. Whiz it all up with some stock.

I'm a huge fan of smoked fish chowders - there's a good one in Jamie's 30 Minute Meals, and the cullen skink recipe from Gordon's Pub Food book is also good.

Basically, sweat a finely chopped onion. Then peel and finely chop a couple of potatoes and bring to the boil in some stock (in the same pan as the onion). Add a fillet of smoked fish (skin on), and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove fish, and flake. Add back to pan, and blend. Season with pepper (you probably won't need any salt). Stir in some cream if you want.

The recipe is very adaptable. You can add sweetcon or peppers for example.

This is a really quick and tasty one courtesy of Cranks Fast Food

Cream of petits pois

30g butter
3 shallots chopped
3 garlic cloves crushed
375g frozen peits pois
700ml vegetable stock made with 2 teaspoons (Swiss Marigold) boullon powder
3 tablespoons double cream (I never add this)

Melt butter, add shallots (or onions) and garlic and sweat until translucent.
Add frozen petits pois, cover with hot stock and cook over gentle heat for 10 mins or so
When peas are tender, blend until smooth
Return to heat and stir in cream
Season with salt and pepper and if posh grate 30g of resh parmesan in.

Very simple but really nice.

Spicy Butternut Squash soup

large butternut squash cubed
2 carrots diced
1 large potato diced
2 celery sticks chopped
1 medium onion chopped
3 peeled garlic cloves crushed (but leave whole)
pinch cumin seeds (or 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin)
1/2 teaspoon chili flakes (or chili powder)
pinch paprika
2 pints stock

Heat the garlic, chili, paprika and cumin in oil for 30 seconds, add the vegetables and saute until coated in the spices for 5 minutes or so. Add stock to cover vegetables, simmer until soft and blend!! I love this soup and so do the kids

www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/goodvegetablesoup_73412

Really great recipe. Make it every week and take it to work. I just sweat an onion and add a bag of soup veg from the supermarket - it's the spices that really make it great. Reckon it costs about ?2 for 3 days soup.

Frozen pea and Mascarpone Soup

Serves 2

1tbsp olive oil
1 small onion (chopped)
400ml (14floz) chicken or veg stock
275g (9¾oz) frozen peas
4tbsp mascarpone cheese
2tbsp chopped basil or mint (or use minted peas)
sea salt and freshly ground pepper

Heat oil in saucepan and sauté the onion for about 5 mins, until it?s softened but not coloured.
Add the stock and, as soon as it is boiling, add the peas.
Return to the boil and cook for 3 mins (word of advice - check peas are cooked).
Stir in the mascarpone and the basil or mint and season with salt and pepper.
Blitz the soup in a food processor or blender, or use a hand blender, until smooth.

Leek bacon and potato soup

Serves 4 or 6 as starter

25g/1oz butter
3 rashers streaky bacon, chopped
1 onion, chopped
400g trimmed leeks, sliced and well washed
3 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
1.4 litres/ 2 pints hot vegetable stock
142 ml single cream
4/6 rashers crisp streaky bacon, to serve

Melt the butter in a large pan, and then fry the bacon and onion stirring until they start to turn golden. Tip in the leeks and potatoes, stir well, then cover and turn down the heat. Cook gently for 5 mins, shaking the pan every now and then to make sure the mixture doesn?t catch.

Pour in the stock, season well and bring to the boil. Cover and simmer for 20 mins until the vegetables are soft. Leave to cool for a few mins, then blend in a food processor in batches until smooth. Return to the pan, pour in the cream and stir well. Taste and season if necessary. Serve scattered with tasty crisp bacon.

Leek and avocado soup

2 medium leeks
30 g butter
2 cloves garlic
570 stock
1 large ripe avocado
about 150 ml milk
chives

Cut leeks in half lengthways, wash and slice
Melt butter in heavy saucepan and when foaming add leeks, cover and sweat for 10 mins.
Add garlic and cook for 1 further minute
Stir in stock, salt and pepper and simmer for about 20 mins until leeks are very tender
Halve avocado, remove stone and roughly chop. Add to pot and blend until smooth.
Reheat, adding enough milk to give required consistency.
Serve sprinkled with chives (posh bit)

Chicken Soup

1 onion
2 carrots
2 sticks celery
1 med leek if you like
1 tablespoon plain flour
chicken stock
cooked shredded chicken

Gently fry the onion, carrot and celery in a little bit of oil/butter until they begin to soften, stir in the flour cook for a few seconds then cover the vegetables with hot chicken stock and simmer until veggies are cooked. Add the shredded cooked chicken (cook it until the chicken is hot) and season with salt and pepper.

So simple to make with left over chicken.

Here's another one from Cranks. We call it Green Soup but I think it's original title was cream of spinach and courgette soup. Everyone seems to like it...even kids who hate veg love it!

1 onion
a couple of large'ish courgettes (or more if smaller)
a large'ish potato
packet of fresh spinach
veg stock
double cream (or creme fraiche or something similar)
fresh parsley if you have it but not vital

Chop onions and courgettes and fry in butter or oil until onion is clear. Add chopped potato, spinach and veg stock (enough stock to make sufficient soup at the end - depends how sloppy you like it). Simmer for about 20mins. Whizz up with hand blender in the pot. Add cream, black pepper (and maybe salt) to taste.

I usually use the swiss bouillon veg stock.

Love this thread, am inspired to make ... well all of them really, about time I moved away from my trusty Carrot and Coriander :

Chop about a pound of carrots and a couple of leeks and soften in a couple of good size knobs of butter for 5-10 mins. Stir in a good tablespoon of flour and tablespoon of powdered coriander, cook for 1 min. Add a couple of pints of veg stock. Simmer for about 20 mins. Blend. Stir in a pot of natural yogurt. Yum.

Yum yum and thanks - I'll be trying lots of these!

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/4772/potato-and-savoy-cabbage-soup-with-bacon

Made this last night and it was gorgeous! There's another on this website which is really lovely too - pea & pesto! You make fish fingers and chop them up as croutons. It's awesome. Both are in the healthy low fat range too!

These are my two current favourites -

Vegetable - finely slice three sticks of celery and two leeks, dice an onion, four carrots and four potatoes - chuck into a pan with some olive oil and fry for a couple of minutes. Add some fresh thyme and fresh rosemary plus vegetable stock and lots of black pepper. Whack into the oven for 40 minutes or so (I prefer this to cooking it on the stove because I can just ignore it!). Once the veggies are soft, mash some of the soup with a potato masher to thicken the liquid a bit. Then add other vege - sliced green beans, some frozen peas and corn etc and cook for another fifteen minutes or so. This makes enough for two days (you will need more water and can chuck some more vege in the next day if wished). I sometimes add some pearl barley that I've cooked for ten minutes in the microwave, at the same time as the stock.

Spiced lentil - fry a couple of chopped onions with three diced carrots and some garlic. You can add diced potato, sweet potato or squash at this point too if wished. Add cumin seeds, mustard seeds, black pepper, ginger and chilli flakes. Add about 6 ounces of red lentils, a tin of coconut milk and some water and cook until the lentils are softening. Add a good squeeze of lemon juice. Some cauliflower florets are nice added to this just before the end of cooking too. You can also add other vege as wished - courgettes etc. I like to sevre this with naan bread or chappatis. If you prefer a more tomatoey flavour, you can add a tub of passata as well as the coconut milk.

If anybody has any veggie soups that don't need blending, I'd be v interested. Thanks.

www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/roastsquashandsweetp_90620

Yet another butternut squash one, but this is so easy as you don't need to peel the squash or the sweet potatoes. Often don't bother with the marsala or the blue cheese bit and it's still lovely.

You can use any squash, pumpkin, or parsnip for this and just add whatever seasonings you prefer, I usually use:

However much veg fills your saucepan half-way
2-3 tbsps of lentils depending on size of pan
Ginger, 1tsp or more if you love it
Garlic, crushed 2-5 cloves to taste
Pepper & salt to taste
Curry powder to taste
Good squirt of lemon juice to taste
Veg stock to cover all ingredients

Just throw it all in and simmer until veg soft and lentils cooked - prob 20 minutes minimum. Blend it up or leave it chunky. This will make a really thick soup which you can freeze in batches and add more water when you want to use it. Makes it easier to take into work for lunch! I usually make one batch a week with whatever veg is cheap. Not had a failure yet and dc love it too.

My favorite soup of all time, I tend to make it a bit thicker (ie less stock) if it's going to be a main meal.

Ingredients
4 tbsp Natural Greek Yoghurt/ Double cream /or Sour Cream
1 Onion
1 clove garlic
450g Sweet Potatoes/ Butter nut squash/ or Pumpkin
750ml Chicken Stock
100g Chorizo Puchero Extra (mild if you're making it for people who don't like a bit of a kick)

Instructions

1. Finely grate about a quarter of the chorizo and chop the remainder. Heat the oil in a large saucepan, and cook the sliced chorizo over a moderate heat until crisp and golden in places. Remove and set to oneside.

1. Add the onion and remaining chorizo and cook until softened, stirring from time to time. Stir in the sweet potato and cover with a well fitting lid. Cook for 5 minutes shaking the pan from time to time.

1. Add the stock. Cover and simmer for 35-40 minutes. Blend until smooth. Note if using a food processor or liquidizer it is always best to allow the soup to cool before blending. Reheat if necessary.

1. Season to taste. Serve with a spoonful of Greek yoghurt and garnished with the grated chorizo.

My basic vegetable soup is

Pearl Barley - no idea how much just enough to more or less cover the bottom of the pan in a single layer
1 onion, chopped
1 large potato, diced small
I large leek, finely chopped
2 large carrots, diced small
2 vegetable stock cubes

Put the barley in the pan cover with boiling water and simmer for around half hour on its own.
Then tip all the veg in, add enough boiling water to cover it chuck in the stock cubes and simmer for around 40 mins. Check the seasoning. Do NOT blend!

German potato soup.

6 rashers bacon, chopped with fat taken off
2 potatoes, diced small
2 sticks celery, chopped
2 carrots, diced small
1 leek, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1 chicken stock cube (or vegetable stock if you prefer)

Fry the bacon with a tiny bit of oil until cooked then tip all the veg into the pan and cook for 5-10 minutes. Cover with water and add the chicken or vegetable stock cube and simmer for 30 minutes. Salt and pepper. Do NOT blend!

This is wonderful garlic tortellini soup