I say “off the cuff”, because I quite pretty much had to make this one up as I went along. I’d never made it before- and to be honest had never really intended to- but my sister informed me on the phone today that she had fallen foul of Online Shopping, and had been the unhappy recipient of a glut of red and yellow peppers.

“Make soup!” I heard myself say.

“I don’t have a recipe.  Where would I find one?” she replied.

“Who needs a recipe? It’s easy!” I heard myself say.

“Fine,” she replied.” I’m on my way over with a bunch of peppers. Make me a soup.”

Could I find an actual recipe to hide behind? Could I buffalo.  But then I thought; you said you don’t need a recipe, so put your money where your mouth is. So I called her back, ascertained that she also had a glut of tinned tomatoes, and I was already armed for bear.  So what follows is the recipe I came up with; based in part of bits and pieces I’ve seen on TV, and also on the basic premise that soup really is never as difficult as you think it may be. Sure it can be time-consuming, but most of that time consumption is just the soup cooking away while you go do something else.  In this case, there is added roasting time for the peppers, and a bit of slightly fiddly pepper-peeling, but, as I hope you’ll see, less problematic than you might think, and the end result is utterly delicious.  It ain’t just me saying that. The sister was mightily pleased, as well as being a soup-making convert. One note before we start: You can use red, yellow, or orange peppers for this, but not green.

You will need:

• 4 red, yellow, or orange peppers, or a mix thereof
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic chopped
• 3 cans chopped (or peeled whole tomatoes) in tomato juice
• a small bunch  fresh basil ( if you have no fresh basil, 2 teaspoons dried oregano or marjoram)

Preheat your oven to Gas mark 6 (400f, 200C)

Once your oven is on the go, place the peppers directly onto one of the wire racks and leave to roast for between 30 and 45 minutes.  Check them every 15 minutes or so, and turn them (WITH TONGS OR SOME SUCH) as bits begin to blister and blacken. Once they’re quite blistered and soft- you’ll be able to feel and in fact see this because they collapse a bit- take them out and put them in a bowl. Then either cover the bowl with cling film, or just wrap it in a plastic bag. Leave for a good 15 to 20 minutes then remove the clingfilm/bag and leave to cool for another ten minutes, or until the peppers are just cool enough to handle but still warm. Then pull out the stalk and seed cases from the peppers, but make sure you do this over the bowl to catch any liquid that comes out.  You want to save this. Then just peel the skin from the peppers with your hands; you’ll find it’s terribly easy, and roughly chop the peppers.

Now it’s time for the soup proper.  In a large saucepan, heat the olive oil and throw in the chopped onion.  Sweat the onion until soft, sprinkling a slightly generous dash of salt as you go.  This will prevent the onion from burning, and anyway salt at the beginning means less salt needed at the end. Once the onion is soft add the garlic and sweat for another minute before adding the chopped peppers. Stir them round and let them sauté for a bit while you deal with the canned tomatoes.  Place a strainer over the bowl with the pepper liquids, and empty the cans of tomatoes into the strainer.  If you’ve got whole peeled tomatoes, chopped them up a bit while in the strainer, then stir them all about a bit- also in the strainer- so that the juice falls into the bowl below. Then add the chopped tomatoes into the saucepan, add about half the bunch of basil roughly torn, and stir well.

Leave this mixture cooking over a medium heat for about 10 minutes, then, straining through a sieve to remove seeds, add in the tomato and pepper juices from the bowl. Let it come to a boil, then reduce heat and leave to simmer fairly gently for about 30 minutes, or until the tomatoes don’t have that raw taste.

After 30 minutes tear up the rest of the basil and throw it in. Check for salt, and add a good grind of black pepper. Stir well, then turn off the heat and let the mixture cool down to just being hand-hot.  Then just whizz it in a blender and serve! This is another soup that is equally delicious hot or cold.

Serves 6.