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Tomato Bisque

This tomato bisque recipe is tangy and creamy! This classic soup makes a tasty lunch paired with bread or grilled…

A Couple Cooks – Recipes worth repeating.

This tomato bisque recipe is tangy and creamy! This classic soup makes a tasty lunch paired with bread or grilled cheese.

Tomato Bisque

Here’s a cozy, creamy soup that works in nearly any season: try Tomato Bisque! This vibrant puree melds bright tomatoes, garlic and aromatic vegetables with a touch of creamy for a rich, silky body. It’s pure and simple, perfect with a hunk of crusty artisan bread or a grilled cheese sandwich. Here’s how to make a simple tomato bisque!

Ingredients in tomato bisque

A bisque is a creamy pureed soup that’s French in origin. A traditional bisque uses ground seafood shells as a thickener, like ground lobster or shrimp shells, and heavy cream to add richness. There are also vegetable-based bisques that are blended and thickened with cream, like butternut squash, red pepper or tomato.

While it sounds fancy, a tomato bisque is simple to make: it’s essentially a French-style creamy tomato soup. Here are the ingredients you’ll need:

  • Butter or olive oil
  • Yellow onion
  • Carrot
  • Celery
  • Garlic
  • White wine vinegar (or white wine)
  • Fire roasted diced tomatoes (or San Marzano or best quality tomatoes)
  • Vegetable or chicken broth
  • Sugar and salt
  • Heavy cream
Fire roasted tomatoes

Use fire roasted or best quality tomatoes

The key to this tomato bisque recipe? The quality of the tomatoes. Low quality canned tomatoes have a bitter, flat flavor that can’t be compensated with extra seasoning. If you can find fire roasted tomatoes, they have a pure, developed flavor with less simmering time. Here are a few notes on finding best quality tomatoes:

  • Fire roasted tomatoes are a type of canned tomato that’s cooked over an open flame before canning. It makes the flavor beautifully sweet out of the can, instead of acidic like many canned tomato varieties.
  • Where to get them? This type of tomatoes are becoming pretty easy to find in grocery stores in the US; they’re sold by several brands (Muir Glen is a favorite of ours). Look in the canned tomatoes section.
  • What if you can’t find them? Substitute the best quality canned tomatoes you can find and increase the simmer time by 10 minutes. Add 1 teaspoon of sugar if the flavor still seems bitter.
Tomato bisque recipe

Tips for tomato bisque

This tomato bisque recipe is simple to make: you’ll sauté the vegetables, add tomatoes and broth and simmer, then puree the soup and add cream. Here are a few pointers:

  • Sauté the vegetables until tender. It’s important to make sure the vegetables are tender before adding the tomatoes so they’re not crunchy in the final soup.
  • A standard blender works best (vs a stick blender). We used to love the convenience of an immersion blender (aka stick blender), but it doesn’t get the soup nearly as creamy of a texture.
  • Don’t skimp on the cream. The cream brings a rich, thicker texture and a luxurious mouthfeel. It’s absolutely essential!

Ways to serve it

Pureed soups like tomato bisque are delicious: but they’re not a meal in themselves! You’ll need to add some protein to make a filling meal. Here are a few ideas:

Tomato bisque recipe

More soup recipes

Love cozy soups? Here are a few more great soup recipes to try?

This tomato bisque recipe is…

Vegetarian and gluten-free.

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Tomato Bisque

Tomato Bisque


  • Author: Sonja Overhiser
  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 25 minutes
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 4

Description

This tomato bisque recipe is tangy and creamy! This classic soup makes a tasty lunch paired with bread or grilled cheese.


Ingredients

  • 3 tablespoons salted butter or olive oil
  • 1 medium yellow onion, finely diced
  • 1 carrot, peeled and finely diced
  • 1 stalk celery, finely chopped
  • 4 garlic cloves, finely minced
  • 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar**
  • 28-ounce can fire roasted diced tomatoes*
  • 1 quart vegetable broth or chicken broth
  • ½ tablespoon sugar
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • ⅓ cup heavy cream

Instructions

  1. In a medium pot, heat the butter or olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion, carrot and celery and sauté for about 6 to 8 minutes, until the onions are tender and translucent. Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds until fragrant. Add the white wine vinegar and cook until evaporated.
  2. Add the tomatoes, vegetable broth and salt and bring to a steady simmer. Simmer for 15 minutes. Carefully transfer to a blender using a ladle, then blend until creamy (or an immersion blender). Stir in the cream.
  3. Serve immediately, garnished with a drizzle of olive oil or cream and chopped or thinly sliced basil. Leftovers store refrigerated for up to 4 days or frozen for 3 months.

Notes

*If you can’t find fire roasted tomatoes, use the best quality tomatoes you can find (San Marzanos are also a flavorful variety). Simmer for an additional 10 minutes, then taste and add a teaspoon or so of sugar if the flavor tastes bitter.

**If you have it on hand, substitute ¼ cup white wine and cook until all of the wine evaporates. 

  • Category: Soup
  • Method: Stoveop
  • Cuisine: French
  • Diet: Vegetarian

Keywords: Tomato bisque, tomato bisque recipe

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Creamy Vegan Broccoli Cheddar Soup

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Creamy Vegan Broccoli Cheddar Soup

We absolutely love broccoli cheddar soup, but relying solely on store-bought vegan cheddar for a “cheesy” flavor? That felt like cheating. Instead, we set out to recreate the cheesy flavor with whole food ingredients and as many vegetables as possible. The result? Luxuriously creamy, nutrient-packed soup with classic, indulgent flavor. Swoon!

Just 10 ingredients required for this comforting dish that might just become your new favorite way to eat broccoli.

Creamy Vegan Broccoli Cheddar Soup from Minimalist Baker →

Cozy At Home Spicy Any-Veggie Soup

Hi everyone! It has been so hard to find the right words for this post as my heart is breaking for the world right now. I hope you are all staying safe and doing well. How are you doing? I’m wishing you all love and strength to get through whatever challenges may be coming your…

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The post Cozy At Home Spicy Any-Veggie Soup appeared first on Oh She Glows.

Hi everyone! It has been so hard to find the right words for this post as my heart is breaking for the world right now. I hope you are all staying safe and doing well. How are you doing? I’m wishing you all love and strength to get through whatever challenges may be coming your way during this pandemic. We’re about to start our 7th week of “sheltering at home” and are all doing well & taking things one day at a time. 

A gift from my heart 

We’ve been trying to do our part by helping the community in various ways, but I also want to do a little something personal for some of my blog readers who are working on the frontlines and in essential services during this pandemic. This idea is a small way for me to connect with you and say thank you for all that you’re doing! So that said, I’d like to mail a signed and personalized copy of my brand new cookbook (my very first hardcover….eek!), along with an Oh She Glows Recipe App download, to 15 frontline and essential workers located in Canada or the US. These gifts will be sent out as soon as my book launches early this fall. Side note: I almost nixed this idea because I worried there would be hard feelings if I couldn’t send one to everyone who reaches out (I will likely have a lot more than 15 emails), but I hope you’ll understand that even though I can’t send you all one, I’d still like to do this to bring a smile to some of your faces during this difficult time. (And I’ll be doing more cookbook giveaways for the entire OSG community in the late summer and fall, too, so there will be other opportunities coming up.) You can nominate yourself or someone you know. Please send a brief email along with your city, and province or state (or your nominee’s story and location) to frontline@ohsheglows.com by May 1, 2020. We’ll select 15 frontline and essential heroes and I will cover all costs of shipping, the book, etc. Due to the volume of emails we anticipate receiving, we’ll only be able to reply to those who are selected, but I want to say a huge thank you in advance for sharing your story with me and to all of you out there who are making sacrifices for your communities every day.

A little about this soup

Today, I’m sharing a versatile, nutrient-packed, and pantry-friendly soup that I’ve been making for the past several weeks. I can’t tell you how much of a go-to recipe this has been while trying to juggle work deadlines and refereeing (oops, I mean parenting) and homeschooling. You can use virtually any veggies you have on hand as long as it totals about 8 cups (be sure to see the Tips in the recipe below for ideas). I’ve created both Instant Pot and stovetop versions for you as well. I love that I can throw everything into my Instant Pot, turn it on, and walk away! And the stovetop version is almost as simple…the only difference is that you’ll need to stir it a few times during cooking. I’m whipping this up twice weekly until the warm weather sets in. I hope it brings you some comfort during these trying days. I’d love to hear which veggie combos you use…my favourite combo so far is: broccoli, carrots, butternut squash, frozen green beans, and sliced cremini mushrooms. A nutrient powerhouse! I’m not joking when I say that I’m eating this daily for lunch…it helps balance out all the baked goods that I’ve been stuffing in my face…lol. 

PS – I’ll be sure to share a lot more details about the new book (as well as the big cover reveal!) soon. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our newsletter, as we’ll be relaunching it this spring and revealing the cover and details there first.

Sending you all love, good health wishes, and big virtual hugs,

Angela xoxo

Cozy At Home Spicy Any-Veggie Soup

Vegan, gluten-free, grain-free, nut-free, refined sugar-free, soy-free

4.7 from 32 reviews
Yield
8 cups (2 L)
Prep time
15 minutes
Cook time
25 minutes

This spicy, bursting-with-flavour soup can be made with whatever veggies you have lurking in the crisper and pantry. My favourite combination of veggies is broccoli (rich in immune-boosting vitamin C), butternut squash, carrots, and frozen green beans, and I’ve detailed the amounts I use in my recipe below. You can use any veggies you love as long as it totals 8 cups of chopped veggies (see my Tip below for ideas!). I’ve also provided two different cooking methods: a hands-free Instant Pot method and a traditional (but still very easy) stovetop method. The beauty of this soup is that it’s so simple to make—we simply add the ingredients to the pot and let it cook away! The soup’s spicy flavour comes from using a generous amount of red pepper flakes. I like 2 teaspoons for a moderate, zippy heat level, but if you aren’t a fan of a lot of heat, start with 1 teaspoon and go from there. If you want to use my Instant Pot method, you can find the directions at the bottom of the Tips section. This recipe is adapted from my 8-Minute Pantry Dal.

Ingredients

  • 1 tablespoon (15 mL) coconut oil or olive oil
  • 2 1/2 cups (625 mL) water
  • 1 (14-ounce/398 mL) can light coconut milk
  • 1 (14-ounce/398 mL) can fire-roasted diced tomatoes*
  • 3 cups (190 g) broccoli florets (1 1/2-inch florets)**
  • 2 cups (270 g) peeled, seeded, and chopped butternut squash (1/2-inch cubes)
  • 1 1/2 cups (195 g) chopped peeled carrots (1/2-inch thick coins)
  • 1 1/2 cups (160 g) frozen cut green beans***
  • 2 teaspoons red pepper flakes, or to taste****
  • 1 teaspoon fine sea salt, or to taste
  • 1 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 1 cup (170 g) uncooked red lentils
  • 2 tablespoons (30 mL) apple cider vinegar, or to taste
  • Herbamare, for garnish (optional)

Directions

  1. Stovetop method: To a large pot, add the oil, water, coconut milk, diced tomatoes (with juices), broccoli, butternut squash, carrots, frozen green beans, red pepper flakes, salt (starting with 3/4 teaspoon), garlic powder, and red lentils. Stir to combine.
  2. Set the heat to high, cover with a tight-fitting lid, and bring the mixture to a low boil. Once it comes to a boil, remove the lid and reduce the heat to medium. Stir again, scraping off any lentils stuck to the bottom of the pot.
  3. Simmer, covered, over medium heat for 15 to 20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the lentils are soft and the veggies are just fork tender. The veggies should have a touch of resistance when pierced with a fork. The cook time will vary based on the type of veggies you use.
  4. After cooking, remove the lid and stir in the apple cider vinegar, starting with one tablespoon and adding from there, to taste (we love 2 tablespoons for a lot of brightness). Sometimes, there may be a slight separation in the soup after adding the vinegar, depending on the brand of coconut milk used. This is nothing to worry about. Season with more salt, if desired (I add another 1/4 teaspoon of fine sea salt, plus a bit of Herbamare). I also enjoy adding a bit more apple cider vinegar to my individual serving because I adore its tanginess in this soup. Serve and enjoy. Refrigerate leftovers in an airtight container for up to 4 to 5 days.

Tip:

* I love fire-roasted diced canned tomatoes in this soup, but feel free to use regular canned diced tomatoes if that’s what you have.

** You can use practically any veggies you have on hand (most veggies should work, however, I probably wouldn’t try beets or eggplant, but maybe that’s just me). Veggies to try out: broccoli, cauliflower, bell peppers, carrots, sweet potatoes, yellow or red potatoes, button mushrooms, squash, sautéed onions/garlic/celery, thickly sliced zucchini (with skin), kale, frozen peas, etc. Just make sure the chopped veggies total 8 cups. If using onion, celery, or garlic, be sure to sauté them in the oil over medium heat for about 5 minutes, until softened, before adding the remaining ingredients. I have not tested any frozen veggies besides frozen green beans, so I can't vouch for other ones working.

*** If using French-cut frozen green beans (the thin variety), add them during the last 5 minutes of cooking to prevent them from softening too much.

**** 2 teaspoons of red chili flakes results in a zippy, moderate level of heat (my fave way to make this soup!). If serving to spice-shy folks, start with 1 teaspoon (for a mild soup) and add more after cooking, if desired.

INSTANT POT METHOD:

1.To a 6-Quart (or larger) Instant Pot, add all the ingredients, except the red lentils and apple cider vinegar. Stir until combined.

2. Now, pour the red lentils evenly overtop the mixture and gently press them into the liquid with your hands or a spoon (do not stir the lentils into the mixture as this can result in a burn notice in some machines).

3. Secure the lid in the lock position and check that the Steam Release Handle is pointing to the “Sealing” position.

4. Press the “Pressure Cook” button (or “Manual”, on some machines) and set the cook time to 1 minute on high pressure. After a few seconds you’ll hear a couple beeps and the screen will say “on”. The cooking process has begun! (Pro tip: it will take about 25 minutes for the machine to come to pressure before the 1 minute timer is triggered.)

5. You’ll hear a few beeps when the 1 minute timer is up. Immediately do a “Quick Pressure Release” to avoid overcooking the soup (simply shift the Steam Release Handle to the “Venting” position to release the pressure). Once all of the pressure has been released, the float valve will sink and you won’t hear steam anymore.

6. Carefully open the lid. My Instant Pot defaults to the “keep warm” setting, so I cancel it and turn the machine off to avoid over-cooking the veggies. Stir in the apple cider vinegar (starting with 1 tablespoon and adding more from there, to taste...we love 2 tablespoons for a nice zing). Sometimes, there may be a very slight coconut milk separation in the soup after adding the vinegar. This is natural and nothing to worry about. Season each bowl with a sprinkle of salt or Herbamare, if desired, and enjoy!

Nutrition Information

(click to expand)
Serving Size 1 cup (250 mL) | Calories 201 calories | Total Fat 7.3 grams
Saturated Fat 5 grams | Sodium 270 milligrams | Total Carbohydrates 27.6 grams
Fiber 5.4 grams | Sugar 5.2 grams | Protein 8.1 grams

Nutritional analysis uses 1 teaspoon sea salt.
* Nutrition data is approximate and is for informational purposes only.

The post Cozy At Home Spicy Any-Veggie Soup appeared first on Oh She Glows.