Fire-Roasted Tomato Kale Soup

Winter, spring, summer, or fall, this Fire-Roasted Tomato Kale Soup is a delicious and healthy treat. For the gluten-free folks out there, you’ll appreciate the use of chickpeas instead of pasta, which are more nutritious and also offer a complementary texture to the dish.

Kale is the superfood driving this healthful dish, and it’s a great way to use it up from your garden if it’s in-season. In this recipe, I’m using Tuscan kale because I find it tastes better in soups and is less bitter than other types, but you can use any type of kale. This brothy, slightly-spicy tomato-based soup uses a whole bunch of kale, but once it cooks down, it just adds a gentle bite to the soup.

As for the tomatoes, ever since I started making my own tomato sauces and pastes, I have come to adore the flavor of grilled and oven-baked tomatoes. The grill and oven bring out their sweetness and when you broil them, you get a little added smokiness. This Fire-Roasted Tomato Kale Soup uses freshly baked and broiled tomatoes, but you can absolutely just grab yourself about 60 ounces of canned fire-roasted tomatoes if you want this comforting soup to be a little easier to make.

Fire-Roasted Tomato Kale Soup

Easy to prepare and fun on your tastebuds, this Fire-Roasted Tomato Kale Soup uses home-roasted tomatoes, leafy Tuscan kale, alongside fresh fennel and carrots to soften and smooth out this hearty garden soup.

• Author: Amanda MacArthur
• Prep Time: 10 minutes
• Cook Time: 1 hour
• Total Time: 1 hour 10 minutes
• Yield: 6 servings 1x
• Category: Soups

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• Tomatoes
  • 12 Roma or other sauce tomatoes (about 2lbs)
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1/2 tsp garlic powder
  • 1/2 tsp celery salt
  • 1/4 tsp black pepper
• Soup
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 large white Spanish onion, finely chopped
  • 1 carrot, finely chopped
  • 1 cup fresh fennel bulb, finely chopped
  • 4 cups chicken broth
  • 1 cup chickpeas/garbanzo beans
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 1/8 tsp red pepper flakes (add more for increased heat)
  • 1 tsp celery salt
  • 6 cloves garlic, grated
  • 2 bunches kale, stalks removed & chopped

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 450 degree F. Slice tomatoes in half lengthwise, and gently squeeze or scoop to remove seeds. Toss together on a baking sheet with 2 tbsp olive oil, garlic powder, celery salt, and pepper. Lay cut side up and bake for 40 minutes or until browned on top. Flip over and broil for about a minute. If skin peels off easily, peel now, but if not, you can remove it when it floats to the top later. Roughly chop tomatoes.
2. While your tomatoes are cooking, heat 2 tbsp of oil on medium-high in your favorite soup pot. Then add onions, fennel, and carrots. Cook until onions and fennel are translucent and carrots are tender (about 10-15 minutes). When tomatoes are done, add chopped tomatoes, broth, chickpeas, oregano, garlic and red pepper flakes. Reduce heat to medium-low and let simmer for 20 minutes or longer. Cover if simmering longer than 20 minutes so it doesn’t reduce. Skim off tomato skins as they rise.
3. Remove stalks and chop your kale, and once the soup is ready, taste. Adjust as you like with celery salt, then add your chopped kale and let simmer until soft (just a few minutes), then enjoy!

Notes

• Since this soup is on the thick side, leftovers are delicious baked over chicken the next day.

If you love to grow kale or want to learn how, check out our Kale Gardening Guide. And if you have any questions about making this Fire-Roasted Tomato Kale Soup, leave me a comment below!