Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup + Soup and Co Give Away (RRP$299.95)

Congratulations to Belinda who has won the fabulous Soup and Co.  Her comment was as follows:

Our family and school soup day favourite is Creamy Chicken and Corn Chowder, a deliciously thick, filling and nutritious soup that smells divine!!
With 4 younger children at home and a husband with MS, the cleaning function would HAVE to be my pick of features, anything that saves me time (especially cleaning up as I work nights) has got my stamp of approval!!
This would be perfect for our household as I work 5/6 nights per week and am always preparing dinners ahead – this way I can get everything prepped and hubby can just “press a button” and voila – dinner in half an hour. You little ripper!

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This super delicious and nutritious pumpkin and quinoa soup was made under test circumstances! I had been given a Soup and Co by Tefal to review. According to the makers the Soup and Co creates delicious, healthy soups in just 25 minutes, with minimal effort.

I wanted to see if I could really make this machine work for me. I have been wary of buying machines that have numbers and programs, worried that I will be stuck having to cook their recipes. If you have been reading the blog for a while you will know that lots of the recipes I cook come from combinations of my favorite parts of multiple recipes.

I cooked my first, a Red Lentil Curry Soup as per the instructions and it was ridiculously easy to make and tasted great. The kids weren’t so keen on it, but I knew they wouldn’t be and actually made it for me to freeze for my lunches!

But I needed to see if I could make the Soup and Co work well for me with other recipes, particularly those of my own creation. So I decided to try a brand new soup after dropping master 11 at footy training and see if I could have it ready for us to eat as soon as I came back from picking him up.

Verdict = success!

For the soup I knew I wanted to have pumpkin, some other veggies and quinoa as the ingredients. The manual which comes with the Soup and Co gives you almost a type of formula for the quantities, which you can mix around:

  • There are examples if how much liquid you need for the quantities if veggies used.
  • The harder veggies liks carrots will need longer to cook, more like the 35 min max.
  • Smoother soups cook on setting one.

With all the right ingredients on hand, I set about making the soup and it was indeed ready to serve when we came in from football training!

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup

Ingredients:

  • 800 mls vegetable stock
  • 1 medium onion (100 grams)
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • 600 grams pumpkin
  • 2 large carrots (200 grams)
  • 1 celery stalk
  • 1/2 cup quinoa
  • pepper
  • salt

Method:
Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
I started making the Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup just before 5pm.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
Preparing all the ingredients took me about 25 minutes, but after that all my hard work was done. The rest was up to the Soup and Co.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
I added the veggies and the quinoa.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
Then the stock.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
Put the lid on and set the program on number one and extended the time to 35 minutes and let it go.

I had time to quickly tidy up and stack dishes I had used in the dishwasher and put on a load of washing, before leaving to pick up master 11 from footy training.

The Soup and Co will keep soups warm for 40 minutes after the program has finished.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
Back home from the footy training run and the Soup and Co was keeping our soup warm.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
This was a very big amount of soup – I had filled the bowl to the absolute maximum and as such there were still a couple of chunks.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
I used the blender function for a minute to make it smoother, which is my preference.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
6.22pm and we were all sitting down to some beautiful Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup and toast. And these test conditions were the real deal, complete with sibling squabbling and preschooler over tired melt down interruptions!

The Soup and Co has a cleaning function as well. Once you use that, it is just a matter of wiping out with a sponge and the Soup and Co is ready to go again.

You could easily cook this soup in a traditional stock pot. Simply follow the instructions for my Pumpkin Soup recipe, but use the ingredients listed above.

Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup
 
Author::
Recipe type: soup
Ingredients:
  • 800 mls vegetable stock
  • 1 medium onion (100 grams)
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • 600 grams pumpkin
  • 2 large carrots (200 grams)
  • 1 celery stalk
  • ½ cup quinoa
  • pepper
  • salt
Method:
  1. I started making the Pumpkin and Quinoa Soup just before 5pm.
  2. Preparing all the ingredients took me about 25 minutes, but after that all my hard work was done. The rest was up to the Soup and Co.
  3. I added the veggies and the quinoa.
  4. Then the stock.
  5. Put the lid on and set the program on number one and extended the time to 35 minutes and let it go.
  6. The Soup and Co will keep soups warm for 40 minutes after the program has finished.
  7. This was a very big amount of soup - I had filled the bowl to the absolute maximum and as such there were still a couple of chunks.
  8. I used the blender function for a minute to make it smoother, which is my preference.
 

What else can the Soup and Co do?

For the price of $299.95 and the space it would take up, I wanted to test out what else it could do.

I can happily tell you it makes fantastic smoothies:

Berry Smoothie
Same recipe as here – Berry Smoothie – using the Soup and Co, but much easier as I could make it in bulk.

Protein Smoothie
Protein Smoothie

I used it to make a cake:
Teacake - Apple and Cinnamon
Apple and Cinnamon Teacake

And it also works just as a traditional blender and has an ice function to crush ice.

Soup and Co Review
This will be an appliance I will be using frequently through out my week. I have happily moved it from the window box, where I photographed the Soup and Co for light purposes and given it its own special place on my kitchen bench.

Soup and Co Give Away

Thanks to Tefal, one lucky reader of Planning With Kids will win their very own Soup and Co!

To enter visit the Tefal website and then leave a comment here to tell me which one of the features of the Soup and Co you like the best and what soup they would like to cook using the machine.

The following conditions apply to this give away:

    • The giveaway is open to Australian residents only.
    • You may only enter once.
    • Entries close at 5pm Mon 30th July and will be announced on the blog Monday 13th August.
    • Planning With Kids will shortlist 10 entries and representatives from Tefal will select the final winner.
    • Winner will be notified by email and if a response isn’t received within 48 hours, another winner will be chosen.
    • Good luck!

For more recipe ideas, useful tips and chances to win, connect with Tefal on the Tefal facebook page and twitter account.