Sunday's Soup/Roasted Tomato and Red Pepper Soup

Happy Monday Everyone!!!

I had intended to get this post up yesterday, but my day simply got away from me. But, rather than wait until next Sunday to post the recipe, I thought I would go a head and share it now. Of course, all of us in the U.S. know that this Thursday is Thanksgiving. If you are looking for a lovely soup to incorporate into your meal, you are a little tired of pumpkin soups, and would like something easy to make, as well as delicious, this is the soup to make!

Begin with Roma tomatoes, cut in half and spread out on a large baking pan.

Cut up 2 purple onions, 4 cloves of garlic, and 1 red bell pepper. Spread over the cut tomatoes. 

Sprinkle sea salt, fresh black pepper, 1 tablespoon of sugar, and 1/2 cup of olive oil over the vegetables.

Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 1 1/2 hours, or until tomatoes have browned around cut edges. 

Allow vegetables to cool. Place everything in a blender or food processor, and blend until smooth. 
Transfer blended soup to a pot. Add 1-2 cups of vegetables broth. Bring mixture to a boil, and then simmer for a few minutes. Serve with a topping of basil oil. You and your guests will be in heaven! And, since there is no cream, the soup will make your vegan friends and family happy as well! 

Roasted Tomato and Red Pepper Soup
downloadable recipe

Soup Ingredients;

4 lbs. Roma Tomatoes sliced in half
1 red pepper chopped
2 red onions chopped
4 cloves garlic chopped
1 tablespoon sugar
sea salt
fresh black pepper
1/2 cup olive oil
1-2 cups vegetable broth

Basil Oil Ingredients;

1 cup fresh basil
1/2 cup olive oil
salt to taste

For Soup;
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Slice tomatoes in half and place on a large baking sheet in a single layer. Sprinkle chopped red pepper, onions, and garlic over tomatoes. Sprinkle sugar, salt, black pepper and olive oil over vegetables. Place in oven and bake until tomatoes are golden brown on cut sides, approximately 1- 1 1/2 hours.

Remove from oven and allow to cool. Put vegetables along with all juices in food processor or blender and process until smooth. You will most likely need to do this in 2 batches. 
Place pureed mixture in soup pot. Add 1- 2 cups of vegetable broth to make soup desired consistency. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer until ready to serve.

For Basil Oil;
Place basil and oil in a small processor, or blender and puree until smooth. Add salt to taste. 

Both the soup and the basil oil can be made ahead a day ahead. The soup can also be frozen until ready to serve. 

A note;
Please do not leave out the sugar. The sugar helps to take any bitterness out of the tomatoes.    

For just a little fashion inspiration this morning;
I saw this picture of the gown that Taylor Swift wore to the American Music Awards. LOVE IT!!! For myself, I will make the underskirt longer. While I love the boots, I think I would wear a pair of lovely evening shoes. 

    
Have a wonderful week!

Rhonda

Sunday's Soup/Winter Root Vegetable Soup with Kale

Happy Sunday Everyone!!!

Thank you for all the wonderful comments that were left on my Grateful post. A couple of you had me laughing so hard with the idea of the antics of my girlfriend and I sounding like an episode of I Love Lucy!!! Like I said, we've been friends for 35 years, and have done some pretty crazy things. Yes, we could be our own comedy show ;) Thanks for the laughs, I really needed that. Nothing like a good laugh to cleanse the soul :) 

Have you ever heard of the Moosewood Cookbook? It's a funky, vegetarian cookbook that I absolutely love. In fact, the same friend from the Grateful post gave it to me over 30 years ago. My copy is now a very well worn book, loose pages and a taped together spine. 

One of the things that I especially enjoy, other than the recipes, are the cute little drawings that accompany each recipe. When I began putting the soup recipes together, my goal was to eventually publish a cookbook/soup book. I'm now working on the book(finally), and rather than photographs, I'm doing drawings that are similar to what you might find in the Moosewood Cookbook. 

I'm currently going through my recipes and testing/tweaking them just to make sure that when they are published, and tried, it will taste just like what I make. 

Back in 2013, I published a recipe for a Creamy Winter Root Vegetable Soup.   I love a good cream soup, but when I began to test the recipe, I decided to make it into a vegan version, and that's what I am going to share with you today. 

The ingredients are basically the same, potatoes, carrots, parsnips, onions, garlic and fresh basil.

No butter was used in this recipe, just olive oil. The onions were sauteed until tender in the olive oil, and then the vegetables were added, along with the vegetable broth.

Another change with this recipe is the addition of chopped kale, green pigeon peas (for protein), and dried rosemary. 

If you have never used green pigeon peas before, they are a lovely little pea that has a bit of substance to it, not at all mushy.

This is not a creamed version of the soup, just a nice hearty winter vegetable soup.

Winter Root Vegetable Soup with Kale

printable recipe

Ingredients;

3 tablespoons of olive oil
4 parsnips sliced, about 3 pounds in total
4 Irish potatoes, chopped
4 carrots sliced
1 large yellow onion chopped
4 cloves of garlic minced
4 tablespoons of chopped fresh basil
2 cups finely chopped kale
1 14 oz. can Green Pigeon Peas drained and rinsed
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon dried rosemary 
10-12 cups of vegetable broth 
salt and black pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in a large, heavy soup pot. Add chopped onion and saute until tender. Add carrots, parsnips, potatoes, bay leaves, and garlic along with 8 cups of vegetable broth. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer until vegetables are tender, 20-30 minutes. Add chopped fresh basil, chopped kale, pigeon peas, and rosemary. Adjust liquid. Depending upon the size of your vegetables, you may need to add up to 4 more cups of broth. If more broth has been added, bring to a boil once again, then reduce to simmer and cook for another 10 minutes, giving the herbs and kale time to flavor the soup.

Serve with warm crusty bread, or my favorite, a pan of fresh made cornbread. 

The recipe yields 8 hearty servings. 

If you give it a try, hope you enjoy it!
Rhonda

Eating For Your Future/The Secret Is In The Sauce!

Why is it that we eat hearty meals when it's cold out, and light meals when it's warm? Especially when the result of eating hearty meals in the winter means that we spend the summer trying to get off the extra pounds that we put on while eating the hearty food??? Just a funny thought that popped in my head :) 

So, if you are trying to eat a little lighter, or you just like eating a lighter meal during the warm summer months, this salad is delicious, but the secret is truly in the sauce. I found it on Design Sponge, such a great resource. The original recipe includes chicken, so if you enjoy chicken, by all meals add it in. You can find the recipe for Christina Ha's Vietnamese Chicken Salad HERE.  

This is not a vegetarian dish, even if you leave out the chicken as the dressing includes fish sauce. If you do follow a vegetarian diet, but don't mind a little fish from time to time, this dish is a must try. I made the salad without the chicken, but of course included the fish sauce for the ginger vinaigrette dressing. 

When I stopped at the store, they had just gotten in the most beautiful fresh cabbages. I was SO happy!

The recipe calls for fresh basil, mint and cilantro. I wish you could have been in my kitchen when I cut up the herbs. The fragrance was intoxicating! 

So as I said, the salad is quite light. After making the salad the first time, I have decided that the next time I make this, and there will be a next time, I am going to boil rice noodles, allow them to cool and then add them to the salad. The addition of the rice noodles will make the salad a little heartier and more satisfying as a main dish.

The only changes I made to the recipe were of course, the deletion of the chicken. I toasted slivered almonds rather than peanuts, and I did not top the salad with the fried shallots. Didn't really need them, but if you really like fried shallots, by all means add away! Personally, I felt that the fried shallots would take away from the fresh aromatic aspect of the herbs. But, my opinion :)

Hope you enjoy the salad if you give it a try.
Happy Eating Light!
Rhonda

My Favorite Summer Salads

There is nothing better in my book than being able to go out my front door and pick fresh tomatoes and peppers. In fact, my husband has caught me standing in front of my tomatoes, eating the tomatoes right off the vine. Hey, they are good!! To me, they are better than candy. I don't have a large garden by no means, just a few tomatoes, banana peppers, a cayenne pepper bush, fresh basil, chives and sage. A rather eclectic mix I guess.

There are 2 salads that I love to make, so I thought I would share them with you. 

The ingredients for the first salad are;

Fresh Blueberries  

Cherry Tomatoes, I like a mixture of varieties. This year I grew the red and the orange.

1 Banana Pepper, I like the hot variety

Toasted Pine Nuts

Feta Cheese, I like Bulgarian Feta the best 

Romaine Lettuce

I simply tear up my lettuce, sprinkle on the tomatoes, then the peppers, blueberries, feta and finally the pine nuts and serve with fresh ground sea salt and ground black pepper. I love the mix of the sweet blueberries with the spicy peppers with the creamy feta. I serve the salad with a raspberry walnut vinaigrette. And shame on me, I do not make my own. For those of you here in America, try the Newman's Own brand. It's my favorite.  

The second salad that I love is beyond simple. A friend of mine grows heirloom tomatoes. They are so rich in flavor. She too has caught me in her garden eating a tomato like it was an apple.
For this salad, I simply slice the tomatoes and arrange them on a plate. Sprinkle the tomatoes with fresh ground sea salt, and a little red pepper. I then chop a small hand full of fresh basil and sprinkle it over the tomatoes. The next layer is crumbled feta and chopped fresh chives. I then sprinkle on a good quality olive oil and about a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar. I top it off with a little fresh ground black pepper and I have lunch! I like to serve the salad with a piece of French bread as the sauce that is left on the plate is too good to leave behind and the French bread is perfect for sopping it up.

If you have a favorite salad concoction, let me know. I'd love to give it a try!