Italian vegetable soup

A light, fragrant vegetable soup with fennel, carrots, peppers and ripe tomatoes, finished with a spoonful of basil pesto — summer in a bowl, ready in about half an hour.

Ingredients (serves about 4)

• Celery

• 0.5 fennel bulb
• 3 carrots
• 1 bunch spring onions
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 1.6 l organic vegetable stock
• 1 bell pepper
• 2 zucchini
• 6 medium-sized ripe tomatoes
• 4 tsp basil pesto (optional)

Preparation

1. Prep the vegetables. Wash and trim everything. Cut the fennel into strips. Halve the carrots lengthwise and cut them into batons.

2. Build the base. Heat the olive oil in a large pot. Sweat the carrots and fennel for 1–2 minutes, then add the tomato paste and let it cook briefly to take off its raw edge. Deglaze with the vegetable stock and bring to the boil.

3. Simmer. Let the soup simmer gently for about 20 minutes in total.

4. Add the firmer vegetables. Meanwhile, remove the core from the bell pepper and dice the pepper and the zucchini. Add them after roughly half the cooking time — about 10 minutes in.

5. Add the tomatoes and onions. Quarter the tomatoes and cut the spring onions diagonally into thin strips. Stir them in after another 5 minutes or so, so they keep a little bite.

6. Serve. Ladle the soup into bowls or soup plates. If you like, swirl in 1 teaspoon of basil pesto per serving just before serving.

Notes

This is a forgiving soup — use whatever summer vegetables you have on hand, and adjust the stock to get the consistency you like. For a heartier bowl, add a handful of small pasta or some cooked white beans in the last few minutes. Keep the vegetables slightly firm; they should still have texture rather than dissolving into the broth.

The base is fully plant-based. Traditional basil pesto, however, usually contains Parmesan (dairy) and pine nuts (nuts) — reach for a vegan, nut-free pesto if that matters to you, or simply leave it out and finish with a drizzle of good olive oil and a few torn basil leaves instead.