Damnit Cibo! pumpkin and chorizo soup

We were so hungry we woofed this down before I thought to take a photo. I will do better next time ... Here is a recipe for a super fast soup inspired by the usual lack of anything useful in the fridge and our utter desolation that our favourite lunch spot has stopped offering 'all you can eat' italian wonderment for under £7.00. NOFAIR!


Ingredients (roughly speaking)

The curvy business end of a small butternut squash, deseeded and chopped smallish
(I did peel this one for speed but you don't have to)
Two carrots, sliced
One small red onion, chopped (I often use celery and onion in combo but - oh oh no go on the celerio)
About 4cm of a chorizo sausage, sliced and diced (you can use more, I didn't have any)
cup of organge juice
table spoon of swiss bouillon powdered stock
half an apple chopped
Olive oil and butter or just olive oil (I didn't have enough - desperate times...)

Now what?

Chop your onion and put it into a large pot with the oil and melting butter on a medium heat - sweat for a few minutes, but don't worry to much if they colour up.

In the meantime chop up your carrots, pumpkin and apple and pop them into the pot to sweat it out a bit too. After a few minutes add a cup of orange juice.

Boil a kettle full and while you're waiting chop up your chorizo and chuck that into the pot, if you like chilli you can add this to the heat now.

Pour around a litre of boiling water into the pan and add the bouillon. Cover the pan and adjust the heat so that you have a lively party bubble going on. You can leave the veggies to get to know each other for around 15 - 20 mins. Enough time to let them go soft and reduce the stock.

Whiz the lot up with a hand blender and adjust the seasoning to taste. (You won't need any salt but you might like a little black pepper).

If you want to get fancy and you're the kind of goddess that has fixings in the fridge at all times - you can add creme fraiche or greek yoghurt and a few extra slices of chorizo.

We scoffed ours with a couple of frozen sausage rolls that I stuck in the oven to cook while I slung the soup together. It all tasted lovely and we were glad that it was too cold and we were too busy to go out for lunch.