Roasted Winter Vegetable Soup is Packed with Antioxidants

Roasted Winter Vegetable Soup

I love fall/winter soups. There’s nothing more satisfying and delicious to me. Serve a hearty soup with a small green salad and a slice of whole grain bread and you’ve got dinner ready. And if you make a large pot of soup like I do, my family and I can eat it for a few days. It makes putting dinner on the table ultra-easy when all you have to do is reheat soup.

This month’s Recipe Redux theme is to think about orange and other fall colors and offer recipes that are antioxidant-rich, especially in beta-carotene. So, I decided to make a hearty winter soup. But I didn’t just want butternut squash in it. Why not have several winter squashes and throw in a few carrots and a sweet potato?

I find it is much easier to cut a whole winter squash in half, roast it, and then scoop out the cooked insides. Trying to peel raw winter squash and cutting it into cubes can be quite challenging if you ask me. And, if you are going to roast the squash, why not also roast the sweet potatoes, onions, carrots and garlic at the same time. I love the taste of roasted veggies. It adds another flavor dimension to the soup. After these veggies are roasted, they are combined with canned diced tomatoes, chicken broth, and seasonings. You then puree the soup (carefully) in a blender and serve it with small dollops of plain yogurt on top. The orangish-golden color of the soup contrasts nicely with the white yogurt.

Best of all, one serving of this soup costs only about $1.10 a serving and it is packed with nutrition. One serving is only 124 calories, provides 2 grams of fat, , 390% of one’s vitamin A, 49% of vitamin C and 25% of the dietary fiber recommended for a day.

Click here to download and print a copy of the complete recipe, with nutrition analysis and cost per serving information.

How well do you know your winter squashes? Click here to see images and descriptions of 15 different winter squashes by Linda Stradley of What’s Cooking America. Her description includes taste, seasonality, & best ways to prepare the squash. She also has tips on how to purchase, prepare, and store winter squashes.

Be sure to check out colorful, antioxidant-rich recipes from other Recipe Reduxers. get the InLinkz code