Chickpea, Tomato and Bread Soup
Recipe Description
This recipe is from Yotam Ottolenghi's vegetarian cookbook "Plenty". It was published in [http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/apr/17/yotam-ottolenghi-plenty-recipes-extract guardian.co.uk]* Serves four to six.
Ingredients
- 1 large onion, sliced
- 1 medium fennel bulb, sliced
- about 120 ml olive oil
- 1 large carrot, peeled, cut in half lengthways and sliced
- 3 celery sticks, sliced
- 1 tbsp tomato purée
- 250 ml white wine
- 400g tinned Italian plum tomatoes
- 1 tbsp chopped oregano
- 2 tbsp chopped parsley
- 1 tbsp thyme leaves
- 2 bay leaf|bay leaves
- 2 tsp superfine sugar|caster sugar
- 1 litre vegetable stock
- salt and black pepper
- 160 g stale sourdough bread (crust removed)
- 400 g cooked chickpeas
- 4 tbsp basil pesto (ideally homemade)
- 1 handful shredded basil leaves
- Heat the oven to 180 °C / gas mark 4.
- Put the onion and fennel in a large pan, add three tablespoons of oil and sauté over medium heat for four minutes.
- Add the carrot and celery, and soften, stirring occasionally, for four minutes.
- Add the tomato purée, stir for a minute, then add the wine and let it bubble for a minute or two.
- Add the tomatoes, herbs, sugar and stock, and season.
- Bring to a boil, cover and simmer gently for 30 minutes.
- Meanwhile, break the bread into chunks, toss with two tablespoons of oil and some salt, and scatter in a roasting tin.
- Bake for 10 minutes, until thoroughly dry, then set aside.
- About 10 minutes before you want to serve, put the chickpeas in a bowl and crush them a little with a potato masher or the end of a rolling pin; you want some to be left whole.
- Add the chickpeas to the soup and simmer for five minutes.
- Next add the toasted bread, stir and cook for another five minutes.
- Taste the soup and add salt and pepper liberally.
- Ladle the hot soup into bowls.
- Spoon some pesto in the centre, drizzle with plenty of olive oil and finish with shredded basil, if you like.
This article uses material from the "Chickpea, Tomato and Bread Soup" article on the Recipes wiki at Wikia and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License
