This week we’re eating… super easy tomato, chick pea and spinach soup

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tomato, chick pea and spinach soup

As regular readers of my blog will know, we eat a lot of soup in our house. I love it, and as a result, so do my three children. I came up with this recipe a couple of years ago when I was craving soup but didn’t have any fresh ingredients in the house. I always have tinned tomatoes chick peas in the cupboard, and I had a bag of wilting spinach in the fridge, so I put it all together with a chopped up onion and came up with this.

It’s a super cheap, super easy-to-cook soup that is full of goodness and incredibly filling due to the chick peas. Vitamin C, iron, protein, B Vitamins, low fat…. it’s super healthy, too.

tomato, chick pea and spinach soup

I made up a big batch of this yesterday – I used four tins of tomatoes, three tins of chickpeas, half a bag of spinach and two onions (I would have ideally added another one but I didn’t have any more in the house) – and it made enough soup to feed our family of five for three meals. That’s amazing considering the total cost of the ingredients was less than £6 and all of it was stuff I had hanging around the house anyway.

The other thing I like about this recipe is that you can add in any other veg that is past its best. After stage 1 of the recipe below, I chucked in two carrots (peeled and sliced) that were looking rather sorry for themselves, and a few cherry tomatoes that were left in the bottom of the fridge.

Here’s how to make it.

 

tomato, chick pea and spinach soup

Ingredients (serves 4)

1 tbsp olive oil

1 onion, roughly chopped

2 cloves of garlic, crushed

2 tins tomatoes (either ready chopped, or plum tomatoes quickly blitzed with food processor)

2 tins chick peas, drained and rinsed

¾ litre vegetable stock

1 tsp dried mixed herbs

A good handful of fresh spinach

Salt and pepper to season

  1. Heat the oil and gently fry the onion and garlic for five minutes or so until soft.
  2. Add the tomatoes, chick pea and stock, bring to the boil and simmer for around 15 minutes.
  3. Add in the spinach and mixed herbs and simmer for another five minutes.
  4. Blitz with a food processor until texture is smooth.
  5. Season with salt and pepper.

Variations

For a creamier soup, stir in 2-3 heaped tablespoons of crème fraiche or soft cheese just before serving.

You can add in any other veg after step one (for example, a couple of carrots or a courgette), frying lightly for 5-10 minutes until softened.

You can see all my recipe posts here, or follow my Cardiff Mummy Says This Week We’re Eating board on Pinterest.

Let me know if you give it a go on the Cardiff Mummy Says Facebook page or you can tweet me on @cardiffmummy

 

1 Comment to This week we’re eating… super easy tomato, chick pea and spinach soup

  1. I’m just in the process of looking for new recipes for soups. Always end up making the same ones: leek & potato, butternut squash & ginger or tomato and lentil. So this looks good. Soup season!

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