Here’s a very easy, spicy (and vegan) soup that’s perfect for these cold days of early spring. The slow roasting really helps build up the flavour which means you can use the cheaper tomatoes rather than the tastier vine ripened ones.  I served the soup with  crunchy rosemary croutons, made with my own sourdough bread and home grown rosemary.

The quantities of ingredients don’t have to be exact but this recipe makes around six bowls of soup.

Ingredients

• 12 medium tomatoes, chopped
• 2 red peppers, chopped
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 2 onions
• 1 carrot, roughly chopped
• 1 teaspoon of chilli flakes
• 1 teaspoon of fresh thyme
• 1 potato, chopped
• 1 litre of boiling water
• Olive oil, about 2 tablespoons
• Salt and pepper

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 150C.
2. Put the tomatoes, peppers, garlic, one onion (quartered) and thyme in an oven proof dish. Add olive oil, salt and pepper and mix well. Cook in the oven for about an hour and a half.
3. Meanwhile heat some oil in a saucepan and add the chilli flakes. Add the  remaining onion (chopped), carrot and potato and cook for about 5 minutes. When the tomato mixture is ready, add to the saucepan, mix everything well together and pour in the water. Bring to the boil and simmer for 20 minutes. Blitz with a handheld blender.

Make the rosemary croutons by drenching cubed bread in oil, pepper, salt and chopped rosemary. Spread out on a baking tray and cook at 220C for about 5-10 minutes – keep an eye on them to make sure they don’t burn.

Do you have a cheap, fresh and easy recipe I can try? Let me know and I’ll feature it on the site and link back to you.

You can also follow on Twitter @CheapFreshandEasy and Instagram  (cheapfreshandeasy) and you can use the hashtag #cheapfreshandeasy in your own posts and I will leave a comment for you.