Roasted Chickpea Soup gives you NUTTINESS and EARTHINESS in every spoonful! Creamy and healthy — hard to believe there is NO cream added!
If you have had hummus, you know that this dish, Roasted Chickpea Soup, will be creamy even WITHOUT adding any cream. That’s what I like about it. When I make pumpkin soup, I add some milk, when I make mushroom soup, I add some more cream; but not with Roasted Chickpea Soup. All the creaminess you get in the soup comes from the ‘underrated’ chickpeas or garbanzos (as we call them back in Manila). 🙂
You can make this soup without roasting the chickpeas, but I like the flavor more when you roast them first – more earthy. I have tried using both dried and canned chickpeas, and to be honest, I did NOT notice any difference in taste; it’s probably because I roast them anyway…?
This is also a great vegetarian dish, and the first time I made it, I realized you can choose to make it as an Italian or Middle-Eastern soup. 🙂 How? 🙂 Let’s see, the first time I made this soup, after doing the last part of seasoning, I was sure there was something missing; a bit of freshness. So, I squeezed almost a quarter of a lemon. When my husband tasted it, he asked if there was lemon in it. When I said ‘Yes’, he asked me whether I was aiming for an Italian or Middle-Eastern flavor. It suddenly dawned on me, I was ‘channeling’ the hummus taste-test when I was seasoning it, hence the squeeze of lemon (It’s a wonder I did not reach for tahini, eh? 😉 )
So, there you go. If you wish to go Middle-Eastern, add a bit of lemon juice and ditch the basil. If you opted for Italian, stick to the basil, it will provide more than enough freshness in the soup. 😀
Looking for more chickpea recipes? Check out my post on a classic tapa with a Moorish flavor.
Roasted Chickpea Soup gives you NUTTINESS and EARTHINESS in every spoonful! Creamy and healthy -- hard to believe there is NO cream added!
- 820 grams (2 big cans) chickpeas, drained
- 3 cups chicken or vegetable broth
- 1 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp ground pepper
- 1 tsp olive oil
- 2 cloves garlic, peeled, kept whole
- 3 sprigs fresh rosemary, use only the leaves
- 1 pc bay leaf, dried
- 2 tbsp fresh basil, chopped roughly
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Preheat the oven to 200 degress C (400 degrees F).
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Season the drained chickpeas with ½ tsp of salt, ¼ tsp of pepper and 1 tsp olive oil. Place chickpeas in a baking sheet and place in the preheated oven for 40 minutes.
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Combine broth, garlic, bay leaf and rosemary leaves in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Let simmer for 10 minutes.
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Add some of the roasted chickpeas to the saucepan. Leave a couple of tablespoons of roasted chickpeas for garnish later. Bring saucepan to a boil and simmer again for 10 minutes.
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Take the saucepan from the heat, remove the garlic and bay leaf, and then blitz with a hand blender (or use a normal blender) to puree the soup. Pureeing the soup in batches is better.
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Pour the puree back to the saucepan and back in the flame. Turn the heat into medium and season the puree by adding the remaining ½ tsp salt (or more if desired). Bring the saucepan to a gentle boil and turn off the heat.
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To serve, ladle soup in a bowl and garnish with chopped fresh basil and some of the remaining roasted chickpeas. You can even add a dash of olive oil, if desired.
- If using dried chickpeas, do NOT forget to prepare them first (as normal) before roasting them.
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