Easy Chickpea Soup

It's back to school for me, and I am glad for it. I truly get into new depths of laziness every time an extended break is offered. Along with hitting the books comes the opportunity to find new meals to cook that are [at least kind of] healthy and fairly painless to make. This recipe is an adaptation of Stylish Cuisine's chickpea soup, which she also adapted from elsewhere. And I just now noticed she posted a newish Moroccan spiced chickpea soup, omg. My tweaks aren't too earth-shattering, just a little quicker and dirtier since I didn't have the canned plum tomatoes it calls for. I also added a little more o' tis and tat.

Makes two to four servings.

5 whole garlic cloves, peeled
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons dried rosemary leaves, crushed as much as you can
1 8 oz. can of tomato sauce
1 15 oz. can of garbanzo beans (chickpeas), drained and rinsed
2 cups vegetable broth*
1 bay leaf
splash lemon juice
salt and pepper, to your taste

Heat the olive oil in a pot large enough to accommodate all of the ingredients. Add the garlic cloves and saute until they are nutty-brown in color and then remove them from the pot. (I'm sure they'd save well for...something else, maybe.**) Add the rosemary, give it a stir, then add the tomato sauce and let it simmer for about five minutes. Add the chickpeas and allow to simmer for another five minutes. Then add the broth and bay leaf, allow it to come to a boil, bring it back down to a simmer, and cover. Let the soup cook for fifteen minutes. Salt and pepper to taste, turn off heat, then stir in the splash of lemon juice. Serve.

I think I'll try it with the plum tomatoes next time while keeping the tomato sauce, and up everything else, possibly doubling the batch. It's a really tasty soup and it doesn't take that much salt to get a multidimensional flavor. The oil does make it a little buttery and that can be adjusted if you so desire.

*I've gotten accustomed to making my own veggie broth; I usually have enough odds and ends from the vegetables I routinely use in my cooking to make a batch after a couple of months. Of course, I keep them frozen in baggies until I cook 'em up! I use what I call my "pot method" of cooking my batches--it all fits accordingly just up to the brim of the pot I always cook soup in. Here's a handy recipe I've recently used as a guide. It's simple to make, and mine is always more flavorful than what I buy at the grocery.

**Oh yeah! I think they would be great to spread on a hunk of sourdough to dip in the soup since it's kind of brothy. Once that thought came to mind, I decided I had to make some sourdough. I'm getting my supplies to get the starter going and those loaves will be incorporated into a couple of meals I'll cook next week. I'll let you know of the delicious consequences.