* I’ve written a follow up, six months on from buying this – it’s over here*

Greg who sits opposite me at work has an annoying habit of knowing exactly what kind of gadgets I like, suggesting them and then watching me buy one a week or so later, when I’ve managed to convince myself I need one.

This week it was a Morphy Richards Soup Maker.

Now, you’ve probably read the name and said exactly what I first said when greeted with this (what sounds) frankly ridiculous idea – a Soup Maker? I’ve got a pan, thanks.

But then I thought about it. The last time I made soup it was a disaster. I seem to remember blending all the vegetables and the bottom of my blender coming open so the liquid spilled out everywhere – I saved what I could, but there wasn’t much.

Which is where the Soup Maker comes in. I love the nights we decide to have soup as it’s so quick – we’ve been having lots of lovely spicy butternut squash soups that are on offer at Ocado – but this appealed. The idea of just prepping your veg (as I would do anyway), putting it into a container, adding water and spice and stock and leaving it for 20 minutes then serving just seemed a bit too easy – plus with what limited time we have it means I can spend a bit more with H – I’m never happy leaving a pan boiling on the cooker.

All you do is prepare the vegetables, add them to the Soup Maker, add water, stock, seasoning and leave it, using whichever setting you want – you’ve a choice of Smooth, Chunky or Juice – oh yes, forgot to mention, you can make smoothies in there too.

Then of course there’s cleaning it afterwards, my least favourite job of anything. Actually, it’s easy. They’ve made it easy – and that is something I approve of, as washing up is boring (and the Soup Maker isn’t dishwasher-friendly) – and I’ve cleaned (and stopped using because the cleaning was so boring) so many juicers I’ve lost count.

So yes, we’ve used it twice since Thursday and made some delicious soups – you can make it up as you go along pretty much – the end result is something which tastes good, the vegetables are all cooked so they don’t lose any nutritional value – and it sits perfectly with WeightWatchers as I can now make 0 Points soups!

Tonight Shaun made a spicy vegetable soup, I’m going to share any recipes we make up on here (using the tag souptastically souper)- do you have a Soup Maker and have any good recipes to share?

You can buy the Soup Maker at Amazon and all good stores.

Spicy Vegetable Soup

You need – carrots – however many you fancy, peeled and diced. Butternut squash – peeled, diced and unseeded – just the one. One onion. One clove of garlic. Some curry powder. Stock cube (we use low salt ones). Ginger. Cumin – one spoonful. Curry powder – one spoonful. Chilli powder – one spoonful.

Make sure all the vegetables are diced and weigh around 700g, put them into the Soup Maker, add water up to the full line (if you’re doing three or four bowls of soup), put it on the ‘blend’ setting, and 22 minutes later it’s ready.

If your soup is a bit too spicy, add some milk, cream or yoghurt to spice it down a bit (this worked for H).

Voila!

(n.b. I know the soup looks boring, but it tastes pretty good)