Heirloom Tomato Soup

(Best when all organic ingredients are used)

NOTE: Since this soup keeps well for at least two weeks in the refrigerator (in fact, its flavor actually improves with time) and lends variety to menus by being equally delicious both hot and cold, the recipe provides for approximately 8 -10 generous portions.
This soup can also be frozen—preferably in a glass container that is oven- and microwave-proof—and defrosted slowly in the refrigerator. It is best reheated in a stainless steel pot on stovetop, rather than in the microwave (where some of the ingredients might tend to curdle).
While this is a sodium-free recipe, salt can be added and quantities of the herbs and spices adjusted to taste.

Ingredients:

• 2- ½ lbs heirloom tomatoes of assorted colors, shapes and sizes (more tomatoes make for a denser soup);
• 1 small bunch of dark (‘dino’) kale (yielding 4-5 cups of leaves stripped off their spines);
• ¾ of a medium size red onion;
• 3 cloves of fresh garlic;
• 2 stalks of celery;
• ½ a small to medium fennel bulb with approximately ¼ cup of its thin stalks and dill ‘leaves’ (or ‘hair’) included;
• 1 cup vegetable broth;
• ½ cup fresh parsley (or 1+ tablespoon dry parsley);
• ½ cup fresh basil (or 1+ tablespoon dry basil);
• ½ teaspoon sweet red paprika;
• 1/3 teaspoon powdered Turmeric;
• a pinch of cayenne pepper to taste;
• ¼ teaspoon powdered ginger;
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce;
• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil;
• ¼ cup apple cider vinegar;
• 1 tablespoon honey;
• 1 whole egg;
• ½ – ¾ cup plain goat yogurt;
• 8 – 10 cups of bottled spring water—to be added to as needed.

Directions:

(It’s best to chop and prepare all the ingredients before starting to cook, using separate bowls or other containers for each ingredient. Add ingredients in the order indicated below.)

= Cover bottom of big soup pot with olive oil;
= Chop and add onion and sauté on low heat until onion turns glassy;
= Chop, add and sauté garlic for 6-8 seconds;
= Chop, add and sauté heirloom tomatoes (skin-on to maximize Lycopene content);
= Strip kale leaves off their hard spines, shred by hand about 2-3 cups, add to above, mix well;
= Chop and add fennel ½ bulb, strip dill and chop with the thin stalks and add to above;
= Chop and add parsley if fresh—if not, add 1+ tablespoon dry parsley to spice mixture below;
= Chop and add basil leaves if fresh—if not, add 1+ tablespoon dry basil to spice mixture below;
= Add cup of vegetable broth;
= Add Worcestershire sauce;
= Turn heat down, cover pot & simmer;
= In a saucer, mix the spices (i.e. ½ teaspoon sweet red paprika, 1/3 teaspoon powdered Turmeric, a pinch of cayenne pepper to taste, ¼ teaspoon powdered ginger), and dry parsley and basil if used instead of fresh—add and mix well into ingredients in the pot;
= Keep mixing and simmering for 1 minute;
= Add spring water—less for a thick soup, more if you prefer thinner broth;
= Cover and simmer until hard ingredients have disintegrated (add water to replace whatever has cooked off or evaporated);
= In a cup, mix well the ¼ cup apple cider vinegar and 1 tablespoon honey until latter is absorbed in the vinegar and add to pot, mixing it in thoroughly;
= When ingredients have become soft, turn off cooktop, keep pot covered with tight-fitting lid until soup stopped simmering and has begun to cool down;
= Whip up the (whole) egg with the ½ – ¾ cup plain goat yogurt and drizzle slowly into soup to avoid curdling;
= Leave pot uncovered.

Soup is ready to eat. Refrigerate what is left—it will keep fresh and increasingly flavorful for 12 – 14 days.

Correspondence with Deborah Szekely regarding this Heirloom Tomato article

 Deborah Székely is the renowned founder of two world-class spas, The Golden Door in S.D. and Rancho La Puerta in Tecate, Mexico. This remarkable, Pilates- and Yoga-practicing nonagenarian continues to reinvent herself—this time as the publisher and contributing author of the Wellness Warrior (www.wellnesswarrior.org), a content-rich online Newsletter focused on Székely’s lifelong passion for living and creating environments for healthy lifestyles.

9/6/14

Subject: Organic heirloom tomato soup recipe

Dear Deborah,

We are enjoying your Wellness Warrior (www.Wellnesswarrior.org) newsletter and wanted to reciprocate by sending you the enclosed recipe, posted on our www.freerangeclub.com site, which I hope you will find as delicious and healthy, as our family and friends did when we served it at our latest dinner party.

Bon appetit,

Dina Eliash Robinson

Editor in chief

www.freerangeclub.com

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10/13/14

Dear Dina,

Thank you for the delicious recipe.  I drooled reading it; it sounds great.  I have just returned from almost a month of travel.  Hence, the delay in responding.  The recipe is now in the hands of our cooking school chef.  I am sure she will be as impressed as I am.  I will ask her to make it up on a day that I am at the Ranch so I will be able to taste it.  My regret to my month of absense is that we missed the tomato season.  Have you tried it with canned or frozen tomatoes?  I have put the recipe in a file for Summer 2015.

All good wishes,

Deborah Székely

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10/18/14

Dear Deborah,

Many thanks for your kind words about our heirloom tomato soup recipe.

In answer to your questions—and some you did not even ask:

(1) My research and interviews with two bio-chemists knowledgeable about the food and health connection, convinced me to never use canned tomatoes, mostly because of the interaction between the tomato’s acids and the leeching toxins from the metal cans.

(2) In fact, even acid-free canned foods need to be viewed with some suspicion (and eaten as rarely as possible), since the cans contain aluminum, which has been linked repeatedly over the last several years to Altzheimers and dementia by some brain researchers. As a firm believer in prevention (i.e. better safe than sorry), I have discarded all our aluminum pots, pans and cooking utensils years ago and replaced them with good quality stainless steel duplicates. What’s more, ever since I noticed a marked improvement in the flavors and after-taste-free quality of my cooked foods, I’ve been strongly recommending a general avoidance of cooking or eating in or with anything made of aluminum. As a bonus, I have found that stainless steel pots and pans hold up better (do not warp or discolor), are easier to clean and seem to be more pleasingly designed.

(3) Since San Diego is so close to Mexico and thus we have easy (“low carbon footprint” due to short distance transportation) access to various kinds of good quality, fresh, certified organic tomatoes year round at certain farmers’ markets, Jimbo’s supermarkets etc., I never had to freeze tomatoes.

(4) You did not ask this question, but since lots of other people bring it up, here is some useful information: It is important NOT to peel tomatoes because it is the skin that contains lots of its most nutritional component: Lycopene. It is sad to see so many fancy recipes in cookbooks requiring that tomatoes be peeled, and often even much of them wasted by discarding their (delicious, edible and nutritious) seeds.

Please feel free to include all or any of this information in your wonderful Newsletter—though we would appreciate your crediting FreeRangeClub.com for it.

I’ve been forwarding entire issues of, or the links to individual articles from your Newsletter to family, friends and acquaintances and hope that some of the positive responses will turn into subscriptions to Wellness Warrior.

Be well and prosper,

Dina