Food Devil: Roast Pepper, Tomato & Chilli Soup

This soup really is an old favourite of mine, so much so I was really surprised that I had not posted it already. The Soup has 3 simple ingredients (peppers, tomatoes & chilli) that all work together in the cooking process to give an amazing flavour.

I have tweaked the original recipe over the years to have twice as many peppers as when I first made it as I really love the sweetness that you get when you roast a pepper.

The only thing you really need for this soup is time, as you will find the process of just getting the ingredients ready can take almost an hour. The soup itself is ready quite quickly after that. As always when you use chilli’s the amount you use is really all about personal taste. Personally I hardly ever cook the soup with the seeds from the chilli included or if I do I only add a few as if you use too much chilli the heat/spiciness can overpower the other subtle flavours that are going on.

Makes Soup for 6+

Ingredients

15-18 Tomatoes
6 Red Peppers
2 Red Chillis (remove all seeds)
4-6 cloves of Garlic
3 Tbsp Red Wine Vinegar
1 Lt Stock (vegetarian or chicken)
Salt & Pepper
Olive Oil

Cooking Utensils
Large Thick Bottomed Saucepan
Chopping Board
Sharp Knife
Oven Dish
Cling Film
Measuring jug
Large Bowl

Preparation

1. Peppers

In an oven dish mix together olive oil, salt & pepper and toss all your peppers completely in the oil

Place peppers under a very hot grill until all are completely black. When black remove and place cling film over the dish until peppers are cool

When cool, remove blackened skin and deseed and chop all peppers into medium sized chunks.

2. Tomatoes

Remove the tops of all your tomatoes.

In a pan of boiling water (also place a clove of garlic in the water) place your tomatoes for aprox 25-30 seconds (you want to remove the skin so you will start to see the skin break, when this happens remove from water). Place 3 tomatoes at a time. When completed place in a large bowl to cool.

Remove all the skin from the tomatoes and deseed all and chop into medium sized chunks.

3. With the water from the tomatoes use this to make your stock.
4. Finely chop your chilli
5. Coarsely chop your garlic

Cooking

- Place your saucepan on at a medium to high heat. Pour in a small amount of olive oil and then your chopped peppers.

- After cooking for about 2 minutes you now want to add your chilli. Let the peppers & chilli introduce themselves to each other and stir the mixture for another 2-3 minutes.
- Now add your garlic and again let the flavours infuse for 2-3 minutes.

- Now add all your tomatoes and cook together for again 2-3 minutes.
- Turn heat down from medium-high to medium heat.

- The mixture is now ready for the red wine vinegar. Pour the vinegar in and let this work with the peppers & tomatoes for about 7 minutes. You will start to see the ingredients becoming like pulp. This is what you are looking for.