Veganuary Recipe: Vegan Tomato, Roast Pepper and Lentil Soup
Veganuary is here! January is the time of year where we all try something new and a little healthier. Our in-house team have created a mouth-watering vegan tomato, roast pepper and lentil soup, ideal for all year round and suitable for Vegetarians and Vegans.
What you will need
Serves: 4
3 x garlic cloves
1 x medium onion – chopped (I use roscoff for more flavour)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 x red peppers (I use sweetpoint as they have a sweeter taste)
1 x medium carrot – finely chopped
400g plum vine tomatoes – halved with vine taken out (Chefs tip – cut green bit from top to stop soup tasting bitter)
½ tsp smoked paprika
½ tsp turmeric
1 tsp ground cumin
½ tsp chilli powder
1 x handful red lentils – soaked, if not soaked you can cook them. See in recipe below…
Vegan cream cheese for garnish
Salt and pepper to taste
Pumpkin seeds for garnish – roasted
50ml balsamic vinegar
1 x tbsp sugar
Handful of chives, finely sliced for garnish
Method
- Sweat the onion and garlic on a medium heat with olive oil and a pinch of salt until transparent.
- Once the onion, carrot and garlic is cooked. Put your 100ml of balsamic vinegar and 1tbsb of sugar in the same pan and reduce by half.
- Put the plum tomatoes, sweated onion, carrot and garlic, peppers, paprika, turmeric, ground cumin, chilli powder and balsamic reduction in a roasting tray. Cover with foil and roast for 30 minutes.
- Place the lentils in vegetable stock and cook for 15-20 minutes until slightly soft. You still want them to have a slight bite. Strain once cooked and refresh in cold water.
- Roast the pumpkin seeds until they have a nice golden colour, should only take 5-8 minutes.
- Once your 30 minutes is up, take the roasting tray out of the oven and blitz the soup in a food processer until smooth.
- Put your blitzed soup through a fine sieve, this will give it a smooth velvety texture.
- Put your soup in a pan and bring it up to boil, you need to taste this for seasoning and season with salt and white pepper to taste. Put your lentils in once up to heat. Don’t cook them further, you just need to warm them through.
- Divide your soup mix over 4 bowels, put a small spoonful of your vegan cream cheese on top, roasted pumpkin seeds and chives for garnish.
