Spicy Tomato Soup

Chrissyo's Note:

This recipe has been in my family for as long as I can remember. Ever since I was a kid, I can remember my Mother's Tomato Soup on those cold winter's nights while sitting on the poarch on one of the cattle stations, listening to the quiet chatter of the stockmen preparing for an early start on Monday morning. Sunday evening was one of the few times of the week that we could have my Mum to ourselves. The rest of the week was rather busy with early morning starts and busy evenings perparing the bread dough, biscuits and cakes for breakfast and morning teas.

• Total Time: 1 hrs
• Prep Time: 10 mins
• Cook Time: 50 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 4

• 1 ounce butter
• 1 medium onion
• 1 carrot
• 1 tablespoon plain flour
• 1 lb ripe tomato
• 1 pint water or 1 pint vegetable stock
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 pinch ground mace or 1 pinch nutmeg
• salt and pepper
• 1 teaspoon arrowroot (optional)
• 3 -4 tablespoons cream (optional)

Directions:

1. Slice tomatoes, onion and carrot.
2. Melt butter in a medium size saucepan.
3. Add the onion and carrot, cover, and allow to soften for 5-6 minutes.
4. Remove from the heat, stir in the plain flour, add tomatoes, stock or water, bay leaf, sugar, mace or nutmeg and seasoning.
5. Stir until boiling, simmer for 20-30 minutes.
6. Rub soup through sieve, pour back into rinsed saucepan, and reheat.
7. Adjust seasoning, and thicken slightly if necessary with a teaspoon or more of arrowroot blended with a tablespoon of cold water.
8. Reboil to cook the arrowroot if used to thicken the soup.
9. Add cream if used.
10. If cream is added do not boil the soup.
11. If required, a teaspoon of tomato paste may be added to the tomato soup for extra colour and flavour.
12. Serve with crusty bread, the kind that you have to break apart with your hands.
13. Feel free to dip your chunks of bread into the soup.

Reviews

[MizzNezz]

This soup is so good!! I used fresh tomatoes from the garden, and vegetable broth. I put 1/4 cup cream in and heated through before serving. Very creamy, comforting, delicious. An easy recipe that I will use again and again! Thanks Chrissy!!

[dale!]

This is the best tomato soup I have ever eaten! It really is that good. I didn't add the cream, arrowroot or any tomato paste and used nutmeg. I was feeling lazy and whizzed the whole lot up in a blender and tried it without straining it. It was really good but then I thought I'd strain the rest of the soup to get rid of the tomato seeds and it came out velvety smooth. Either way it's a incredibly good soup.

[GinnyP]

I didn't have vegetable stock , so I used water. After tasting, I added kosher salt, celery salt, garlic powder, and basil. Really, really tasty! I probably would not have needed the additional seasonings had I used stock to begin with. Thanks for sharing your family recipe, ChrissyO. I love the flavor, and it's quick & easy.