This hearty soup features my favourite legumes, black beans, plus whatever veges you have on hand, and plenty of delicious herbs and spices. Black beans work beautifully with smoky flavours, and the dark colour of the soup is a gorgeous backdrop for the white sour cream and the colourful flavourful toppings.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

About 4 cups of finely diced mixed vegetables (e.g. onion, carrot, broccoli, capsicum, celery)

1 teaspoon salt

4 garlic cloves, minced

3 teaspoons ground cumin

2 teaspoon dried oregano

2 teaspoons smoked paprika

½ teaspoon chilli flakes (more or less, according to taste)

¼ teaspoon cinnamon (optional)

2 cans black beans, including the liquid

¼ teaspoon liquid smoke (optional)

2 teaspoons vegetable stock powder

Lemon or lime juice

To serve:

A big dollop of Angel Food sour cream

Instructions

1.                          Heat the oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add the salt and the diced mixed vegetables. Sauté for about 5 minutes, or until the veges have started to soften. 

2.                          Stir in the garlic, herbs and spices, and cook for another minute until fragrant.  

3.                          Add the black beans – including the liquid! The starch in the bean liquid will help thicken the soup – and one canful of water, along with the liquid smoke if using, and the stock powder. Stir well, cover with a lid, turn up the heat until it comes to a simmer. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 20 minutes until the beans and vegetables are soft enough (but not mushy) to blend well.

4.                          Blend the soup to your preferred texture with a stick blender (or food processor, or even a potato masher). You can make it completely smooth, or leave plenty of chunks.

5.                          Add a squeeze of lemon or lime juice (or a splash of your favourite vinegar – the slight sweetness of balsamic vinegar would work well) then test the seasoning and adjust as necessary.

6.                          Serve with a dollop of Angel Food vegan sour cream and a side of taco chips!

If I’m making soup, I tend to make it thick (often it’s more like a stew than a soup!) – and one of the bonuses of a good thick soup is that you can load it up with toppings. Try doing that with a posh consommé!! Check out my loaded pumpkin soup recipe – so good.

Beans are amazing little powerhouses of nutrition and tasty goodness. Have you heard of the “Beans is How” campaign which aims to double global bean consumption by 2028 because of their huge health and sustainability benefits?

It’s kinda surprising that black beans are still one of my favourites legumes – I did a big catering job a while back and being somewhat inexperienced in large scale catering I overordered black beans and polenta. The end result was that for the next six months we had either black beans or polenta, or both, several times a week. My family got a bit sick of them but I didn’t!