• Finely chop your onions and carrots. I didn’t have any celery in but you can add it if you like!
• Add a good drizzle of olive oil to your pan and fry the above.
• Give your garlic cloves a bit of a bash and drop them in with the onions and carrots.
• Add your fresh chopped rosemary to the pan and give it a stir.
• Follow with the chopped sweet potato and leave to cook for a few minutes.
• Add your red lentils and stir.
• Add your stock to the pan and leave everything to simmer until the sweet potato is soft. You know its soft if it is easily crushed under your spoon.
• NB: Skim the top of the pan as it cooks. Because Lentils produce a ‘scum’ when they cook, you need to remove it as the soup simmers. If you have time you can help this by soaking your lentils first.
• Using your stick blender blend the soup until smooth.
• NB: Make sure your pan has been removed from the heat and is on a heatproof, even surface.Take care not to hold the blender too close to the surface, make sure it is well submerged before starting. If you are worried you can cover your pan with a tea towel to minimise any damage or use a blender… that means more pots though!

Finishing Touches

• Once your soup is velvety and smooth check the following:

  Texture: If your soup is stiff/thick, add a bit of hot water from the kettle, a little at a time and stir until you are happy with the consistency.

  Seasoning: Taste and season, stir and taste again. The seasoning is down to your preference, remember you can always add but you can’t remove.
• Now add the dried chilli flakes and stir.
• NB: Adding them sooner will make the soup much spicier so be mindful of this if you change the recipe
• Add the Tracklements Fresh Chilli Jam, stir, taste and season if required.
• Serve your soup however you like and save the rest for the another day.