5 Girls in a Flat: Brilliant Bruschetta with Lentil and Tomato Soup

Per request, our Brilliant Bruschetta recipe!

This dish was inspired whist wandering around the Fife Farmer’s Market in St Andrews this past weekend. If you haven't been to the Farmer's Market, you should go! We stood in front of the olive/tomato/pesto stand for about 20 minutes until we decided just what we wanted: Sun Blush tomatoes and fresh green pesto. These turned out to be fabulous choices!

Just down the row was a homebaking stall, with the best looking focaccia I have seen in Scotland. It was so visually tantalizing we had to buy one. We chose a roasted pepper and herb focaccia, and a loaf of fresh bread.

So Saturday night we made MC's bruschetta, served with bowls of Jenna’s Tomato and Lentil Soup. It was all fabulously garlicky, just the way we like it.

Here is what we did:

Ingredients

3 tomatoes

a handful of sun blush tomatoes

4 or 5 cloves of garlic, crushed and chopped

a loaf of bread or a baguette

butter

fresh basil leaves

olive oil
salt and pepper

Turn the oven on to about 200. It’s just to toast the bread so don’t get too fussed about exactness. Slice your bread. Take a bit of butter, maybe a 2 inch slice, and pop it in a bowl. Microwave for ten seconds until soft and mixable. Add some chopped garlic. Stir and smear onto the sliced bread. Place bread into oven to toast. Don’t forget about it!

Next, chop the tomatoes and anything else you’re adding. Some people add onions or peppers, we kept it simple, just garlic, tomatoes, some torn basil leaves from our basil plant (her name is Brenda, she lives on our windowsill) and a twist of pepper and a dash of salt. Stick it all in a bowl, drown it in olive oil and lightly mix. Take the slices of bread out of the oven when they are a bit golden and crispy.

Let everyone spoon their own tomato mixture onto the bread. Eat. Lick your fingers. Eat some more. We unfortunately didn't get a good picture of the bruschetta because we ate it up so quickly! You'll just have to make it yourself!

Like I said, we served soup with this to make it a full CDCN meal. Directions below.

Jenna’s Tomato and Lentil Soup

Ingredients

· 1 celery stalk

· 1 large carrot

· 1 onion

· 1 tin of chopped tomatoes

· 1 tin of green lentils

· 1.5 litres of vegetable stock

· a few basil leaves

· 1 teaspoon dried oregano

· a spoonful of sugar or so (to balance out the acidity of the toms)

· a dash of ground cinnamon

· salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Roughly chop your veg. You’re gonna blend it all in a bit, so no need to dice or slice.

2. Choose a big pot. Stick it on the hob over a medium-high heat, drizzle olive oil over the bottom.

3. Toss in your onions, let them get a bit soft…3 minutes?

4. Then add your celery and carrots. Let them and the onions mingle and soften…6 or 8 minutes?

5. Then drain and rinse the lentils, and add them to the pot.

6. Add the tin of tomatoes too.

7. Pour in the vegetable stock. Or, if you’re using stock cubes, just chuck them in and pour boiled water over. Give everything a little stir.

8. Boil for a few minutes, then reduce the heat and let simmer for a good 45 minutes to an hour. You know its done when you can easier stick a fork through the veg and the lentils are beginning to disintegrate.

9. Turn the heat off and let the soup cool for a few minutes.

10. Now, the messy part. Blend the soup either using an upright blender or an immersion blender. I use an immersion blender I ‘borrowed’ off my boyfriend about a year ago…I affectionately call it ‘The Zizzer’ because that’s the noise it makes.

11. Ok, put the pot back on the hob, low heat. Now we’re going to add the herbs and spices. Start with a tablespoon of sugar, a good dash of salt and pepper. Now put in basil, oregano, or whatever herbs you really fancy.

12. Taste your soup. Let me emphasise this point, taste, taste, taste your food! Don’t serve something without knowing what it tastes like! What if it needs a hint more salt to make it fab? Now, adjust any seasoning. This is the point where I added the dash of ground cinnamon and another tablespoon of sugar. I needed the sugar to balance the acidity of the tomatoes and the cinnamon to bring in a bit of warmth. Stir.

13. Time to serve!