A soup maker is by no means the only way to make soup, although it’s fast becoming one of the preferred options for those of us who are pushed for time and still want great taste. The biggest benefit of making soup at home is the lack of the more processed ingredients that blight man shop bought pre made choices.
So, how do we get soup into our homes?
1 – Shop Bought
This was how I did soup when I first left home and began to ‘cook’ for myself. I’m still partial to the odd tin of Heinz Tomato Soup, but when you need to make soup a lot, tinned versions can work out pretty expensive, as well as having higher levels of sugar and salt that we would use at home in our own recipes.
2 – Soup Maker
My favourite way. Of course it is, this blog is pretty much covering lots of recipes that I make in mine. I’m not sure I’d ever be happy to do away with one in my kitchen ever. Throw everything in and switch it on, then come back around half an hour later to fabulously made fresh soup.
3 – In A Pan – No Blender
Ok, so there’s a lot to say about boiling up some bones, making great fresh stock, and then adding ingredients to make it that way. I used to use a tattie masher to break down vegetables after making soup this way. Not entirely smooth, but not vegetables floating in water either. The only thing I really dislike with this version is the constant need to check on the bubbling pot and keep stirring. I like simple, and I don’t find this method simple.
4 – In A Pan – Blender
As above, but either ladling some soup into a blender to smooth it, or using a stick blender in the pot to get smooth soup in the past, has ended up with a fair few burns on my wrists while I got too close with the blender stick or took it out of the fluid too soon and it sparked up. My worst case was when it hit my face. Thankfully, I had my glasses on and my eyes were protected, but my cheek hurt for days.
5 – Slow Cooker / Pressure Cooker / All In One Cookers
There all have their own merits, though you do need to take into account how you do it. I’ve used a slow cooker for soup, only it took at least 4 hours for the vegetables to be fully cooked. That’s fine if I want to put it on early, go out and come home to nice soup, but then again, I can just use my soupmaker and it’s ready 20 minutes later anyway, so why have a slow cooker on all day, when I can just have a gadget on for less than half an hour?
I have to admit to not having had the pleasure of trying soup in a pressure cooker or all in one cooker yet. I own neither, but if you have some experience to share, please feel free to leave a comment with how you find making soup in other ways.
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