Smoky Minestrone Soup
With our new blog comes… our new recipe section! The old blog is now all but defunct so it’s time to start sharing some of our recipes right here.
When we meet customers at our stalls, they often ask how they can use our sauces in the kitchen. With this in mind, a lot of the recipes shared here will focus on working with Khoo’s Hot Sauce as an ingredient. Don’t worry though, I will also aim to give you plenty recipes that don’t rely on having our products in your pantry, so there’ll be something for everyone.
With the weather getting darker and damper by the day I thought a real classic winter warmer would be a great place to get started.
I have been perfecting this minestrone recipe for much of my adult life, there have been plenty of little tweaks here and there, but I settled on this version a few years ago and haven’t looked back.
Perfect comfort food and an ideal pick-me-up for those blustery winter days.
I appreciate many of us are looking to eat healthily and shed those extra Christmas pounds at the moment so I’ve kept this totally gluten free. However if you do fancy something a bit more substantial I’ve included a note at the bottom recommending which pasta to use and when to add it.
Smoky Minestrone Soup
Ingredients
- 4 rashers Thick cut smoked bacon
- 1 Red bell pepper (deseeded, cut into thin strips)
- 1/2 Green bell pepper (deseeded, cut into thin strips)
- 1 Red Jalapeno (deseeded, finely sliced)
- 1 Carrot (cut julienne)
- 1 Red onion (finely chopped)
- 3 Garlic cloves (peeled and minced)
- 3 tbsp Khoo's Hot Sauce Heavy Smoker (or similar chipotle sauce)
- 400 g chopped tomatoes (tinned)
- 150 g cherry tomatoes (quartered)
- 40 g Tomato purée
- 1 l Beef stock
- 1 tsp Fresh rosemary (finely chopped)
- 1 tsp Fresh oregano (finely chopped)
- 1 tbsp Fresh basil (finely chopped)
- 1 tbsp Fresh parsley (finely chopped)
- 2 tbsp Olive oil
- Sea salt & black pepper to taste
Instructions
- Begin by preparing all of your ingredients.
- In a large stock pot or sauce pan, add the olive oil and bring to a medium heat. Add the onion and garlic and gently fry for 5 minutes until the onion becomes translucent. Remember to keep stirring, don't let the garlic burn.
- Add the carrot and red cabbage to the pan, turn the heat to low and cook for a further 5 minutes.
- Turn up the heat to high, add the bacon and cook for 2 minutes, stirring well. Add the Heavy Smoker sauce and cook for another minute.
- Reduce the heat to low, add the bell peppers, jalapeno, rosemary and oregano and cook for 5 minutes, stirring regularly.
- Add the stock and chopped tomatoes. Simmer for 10 minutes.
- Add the cherry tomatoes, basil and parsley, turn the heat to medium and cook for 5 minutes.
- Season with sea salt and cracked black pepper if necessary. Garnish with fresh parsley. Serve with ciabatta rolls.
Notes
- I kept this recipe gluten free, however if you fancy bulking it up just add 40g stortini or anelletti pasta along with the beef stock.
- If you’re not a fan of chilli, omit the jalapeno. If you like it hot, you can always add more chillies. The Heavy Smoker sauce we use in this dish is a very mild sauce and won’t impart much in the way of chilli heat to this dish, just a deep smoky flavour.
