Blogging Marathon Day 5 ~ Guilt Free Tomato Soup

Today's "Special Choice" - Starters

Srivalli announced mini blogging marathon last week, where the participants had to post each day without fail for 7 days. To make the process more interesting, she came up with several themes as well. Each participant had the choice to choose any one theme and post the recipes under that category. The themes given were

1. Book marked recipes from other blogs

2. Kid friendly dishes

3. Rice dishes

4. Specialty Regional cuisine

5. Starters

6. Street food

7. Sweets

8. Special choice - One dish each from the above categories

This blog followers might have already noticed that I chose and has been posting "special choice" themed dishes. So far in the blogging marathon, I have posted

1. Sweet recipe: Oats - Coconut Laddu

2. Book marked recipe - Kalkandu Sadam

3. Rice recipe: Menthya Rice

4. Kid friendly dish - The all American Mac n Cheese

For today's starter / appetizer theme, I chose this guilt free tomato soup. Tomato soup recipe could be altered depending upon our moods, seasons and the pantry. I have kept it pretty basic and simple though it could be enriched with cream / milk at the serving time. Also can be garnished with cheese / crackers instead of croutons. Addition of the above ingredients however wouldn't keep this soup guilt free any more. :)

Ingredients for 3 servings:

3 tomatoes

1 -2 Tbsp olive oil (or butter if not counting the calories)

1 garlic clove, peeled & crushed / garlic powder (optional)

1 onion, finely minced

1 Tbsp flour / maida

1.5 cups vegetable stock / water (I had used water + Knorr vegetable bouillon)

Salt & freshly ground pepper to taste

Bread croutons for garnish

Note:

Today I went the reverse way. Instead of pureeing the done veggies at the end, I blanched the tomatoes initially and extracted the tomato juice and used it in the recipe. I cooked the soup in the microwave to speed up the process in the later part but the cooking part can be continued on the stovetop. It takes a little longer and needs to be cooked till the raw smell of the tomatoes disappears.

Soup making:

1. Add water to a saucepan and bring it to boil. Add the washed tomatoes and let it cook for about 60 - 90 seconds. Then immediately scoop up the tomatoes and add it to cold water kept in another bowl. Remove the skins.

2. Meanwhile when the water is boiling for the tomatoes, add the oil to another saucepan. Add garlic and sauté for a few seconds and then fry the onions till they turn golden brown on low flame. Then add the flour and fry for a few seconds. Then add the stock / water and bring to a boil. Keep stirring to avoid any lumps formed. When the water starts to boil, add the boullion cube and let it melt.

3. Adding water, grind the tomatoes to make about 2 cups of juice. At this point, if you don't want to see the onion bits in your soup, you can puree the above mixture in step 2 along with the tomatoes. Or you can leave the onions alone.

4. Pour the onion mixture and tomato juice to a microwave safe bowl and cook for about 5 minutes. Stir in salt, pepper powder and garlic powder if using and put it back in the microwave again and cook for a couple of minutes more.

5. Taste and adjust the seasonings if needed. Serve with croutons.

And let's check the other interesting dishes the marathoners have come up with today.

Azeema, Bhagi, Champa, Gayathri Anand, Gayathri Kumar, Harini, Jay, Kamalika, Meena, Minu, Padma, Pavani, PJ, Priya Mahadevan, Priya Suresh, Priya Vasu, Rujuta, Santosh, Saraswathi, Savitha, Shanavi, Smitha, Sowmya, Srivalli, Usha, Veena

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