Roast Tomato and Bread Soup
Stale bread is the ingredient, not a garnish. It goes in early and dissolves, and what you end up with is closer to a thick porridge than a soup — which is exactly right.
- Prep 10 min
- Cook 1 h
- Total 1 h 10 min
- Serves 4
- Vegan
Method
Step 1. Heat the oven to 180°C fan. Put the tomatoes cut side up in a large roasting tin with the unpeeled garlic, 3 tablespoons of the oil, the sugar, a big pinch of salt and plenty of pepper.
Step 2. Roast for 45 minutes. They should be shrunken and dark at the edges with a good amount of concentrated juice in the tin. That juice is most of the flavour, so do not pour it away.
Step 3. Meanwhile, warm the remaining oil in a large pan and cook the onion gently for 12 minutes with the chilli flakes and the chopped basil stalks, until sweet and completely soft.
Step 4. Squeeze the roasted garlic out of its skins into the pan. Add the tomatoes and every drop from the tin. Break them up roughly with a spoon.
Step 5. Add the torn bread and the hot stock. Stir, bring to a bare simmer, then cook for 15 minutes, stirring now and then, until the bread has given up entirely and the soup is thick enough to stand a spoon in.
Step 6. Beat it hard with a wooden spoon for 30 seconds to break down any remaining lumps. Do not blend it — a blender makes it gluey and pink.
Step 7. Stir in the vinegar, tear in most of the basil leaves, and season. Ladle into bowls and pour a thread of good oil over each. Remaining basil on top.
Notes from the kitchen
- This needs genuinely stale bread — two or three days old, dry all the way through. Fresh bread turns to paste. If yours is soft, tear it and dry it in a low oven for 20 minutes first.
- Tinned tomatoes work out of season: use two 400 g tins, roast them in the tin with the same oil, garlic and sugar for 30 minutes, and add half a tablespoon more vinegar at the end.
- It sets solid in the fridge. Loosen with hot stock and check the salt again — it always needs more the second day.
