What We Ate Wednesday Tin Rip-Off Soup

Hello lovelies! It's What We Ate Wednesday again! Last night we had "clean out the fridge curry" which was delicious. Basically some potatoes, mushrooms, half an onion, a quarter of a pepper, a shrivelled up carrot and the scrapings from the bottom of the jar of curry paste.

But I neglected to get a photo before it was all in my belly.

So, instead I thought I would show you something else we ate last week. I like to call it Tin Rip-Off Soup because I am totally copycatting this Baxter's soup.

Now, I refuse to actually buy this soup because it costs something like £1.50 a tin. But I was always intrigued because the soup is accidentally vegan/gluten free and contains lots of things we love to eat.

I *knew* I could make it for less than £1.50 a serving. My soup makes a huge amount--enough to feed us over two days. it goes even further served over brown rice or  Anadama Bread.

The ingredients on the back of the tin are:

Water, Carrots, Butternut Squash (10%), Butter Beans (7%), Haricot Beans (5%), Sweet Potato (4.5%), Red Peppers, Onions, Yellow Split Peas, Celery, Edamame Beans (Soya), Cornflour, Lime Juice, Coconut Cream, Sea Salt, Coriander, Salt, Garlic Purée, Ginger Purée, Cumin, Red Chilli, Sugar, Yeast Extract, Turmeric, Black Pepper, Onion Powder, Potato Starch, Acid (Citric Acid), Lovage Extract, Nutmeg, White Pepper

I figured I could definitely make something along those lines and I was right. So here is my adapted version.

Tin Rip-Off Soup
You need:
1.5 lb sweet potatoes, butternut squash or a combination of both , diced small
1 onion, diced small
1 red pepper, diced small
1 carrot, diced small
lots of garlic
about a TB worth of ginger root diced or grated
1 tsp each ground cumin, turmeric, red chilli flakes, smoked paprika, garam masala

1 tin full fat coconut milk (Lidl sells the best ones--about 79p and nearly 100% coconut cream)
4.5 cups boiling vegetable stock
1 cup red lentils, rinsed and picked over for small stones
1 TB sriracha hot sauce

1 cup defrosted frozen edamame
1 tin butterbeans, drained and rinsed
3 TB lime juice
1.5 TB liquid sweetener--I used golden syrup as we were out of agave and it was fine

1. In a large saucepan, saute the onion, pepper, carrot in a bit of oil until softening then throw in the garlic and ginger root.  Toss in your sweet potatoes/butternut squash and stir.
2. Add your spices and stir to get everything coated with their deliciousness.
3. Add your boiling stock, coconut milk, red lentils and sriracha and bring to the boil. Once boiling, turn down the heat and let simmer for about 20 minutes until the lentils are soft and the squash is done.
4. Stir in the edamame, butterbeans, lime juice and liquid sweetener and stir until heated through.
5. Serve over rice or with Anadama bread. Or both. The slight sweetness of the molasses in the Anadama really compliments the soup. I used to make it with spelt, but these days make it gluten free and it is still delicious. Get the recipe for Anadama bread here: http://spidergrrlvstheworld.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/our-daily-bread.html

If you need to feed a bigger crowd, add an extra cup of stock and another tin of butterbeans and serve over rice.  This will definitely please everyone.

And it didn't come from a tin.