Photo: bastique / Flickr

If you’re having a large dinner party and you want to cater for vegetarians and meat-eaters alike, you can’t go wrong with offering a vegetarian starter. This vegetarian soup takes half an hour to prepare and requires a cooking time of three quarters of an hour. Since it is a healthy option (the ingredients include celery, garlic, carrot, beans and cabbage or whatever is in season), you could consider making it as a meal on its own for your family.

Ingredients

You will need the following ingredients to serve eight: a large onion that has been chopped, 2 crushed cloves of garlic, 4 finely sliced celery sticks, 60 ml of olive oil, 2 tablespoons of tomato paste, 1.5 litres of vegetable stock, 800 grams of chopped mixed vegetables in season like carrots, marrows, green beans, potatoes, cabbage, turnip, peas, corn, butternut, mushrooms and cauliflower. You’ll also need some chopped parsley to garnish the final dish, as well as some salt and pepper to taste.

Should you prefer a thick soup, add 80 grams of cooked lentils, soya beans, rice or barley. A herb flavour can be achieved by adding a teaspoon of origanum, 2 teaspoons of basil and a few pinches of rosemary.

Prepare the vegetarian soup

Place the oil, onion, garlic and celery in a saucepan and cook until the vegetables are tender. Then add the stock and tomato paste and allow the ingredients to simmer gently while you wash and prepare the mixed vegetables. Once they are chopped, place the mixed vegetables in a little water and cook until they are just tender.

Ten minutes before serving, add the mixed vegetables, together with the cooking water, to the soup and season to taste. Bring the soup to a boil and allow it to simmer on a low heat for three minutes and serve.

Tags: cooking, eating healthily, soup, vegetarian