Hairy Dieters Eat for Life Book by Si King and Dave Myers is the second one of their weight control series. Self designated on the cover as “The Hairy Dieters Eat for Life How to Love Food, Lose Weight and Keep it Off for Good!” you would be forgiven for thinking it is just another celebrity cook book that is tapping into the weight loss / healthy eating market. I suppose on the cynical side it is, but what you really need to know and understand is that this book contains a lot of easy to make, beautiful meals, that are both tasty and healthy.

Before I get started telling you about my latest sortie into its pages I will have to emphasize that it is so easy to follow along and every menu  that I have followed, and I mean everyone without exception has worked and been really delicious.

The Picture in the Book that we are aiming for

As the evenings are just starting to turn a little cooler I was in dire need of something hearty, something warming, yet something healthy too and I was not prepared to sacrifice flavor in search of that desire. It was on that night that I turned to The Hairy Dieter’s “Big Soup” recipe. They describe it as “A big soup to make you smaller’. I like that.

Ingredients wise, there is not too much to get to make this soup. Basically it is just some good or decent stock, plenty of fresh vegetables, and some quality Chorizo

On the vegetable front it was a medium onion, a couple of cloves of garlic, a handful of green beans (about 100g), a couple of chopped carrots, and a big handful of chopped kale. The book recipe was for 6 people but I cut it down a bit for two with a couple of spare portions for the freezer.

I bought my Chorizo sausage from, Brindisa on the Borough Market in London, I picked out the Dulce Mild which they describe as Bite size paprika-rich chorizo pieces. To me it was a link of little chorizo sausages. The filling is quite loose and crumbly and packed with flavour and I was quite tempted to just eat them as they were. They recommended that you should ‘Pan fry with a splash of cider or red wine, and then serve in terracotta dishes with crusty bread to soak up the lovely juices’. I kind of wish I had done that now! But I didn’t and they were to make this soup totally fantastic

Ok so lets make some soup

First just sweat down that Onion and Garlic with just a little bit of sunflower oil

Then throw in the Carrot and Chorizo

Add some Paprika and stir until starting to soften and everything is coated with that lovely paprika colouring just a couple of minutes

Add in the stock, a tin of tomatoes, the green beans and the kale, then Sit back and wait

The Soup I Made

It was as simple as that. You just let it simmer until the vegetables were at your chosen level of bite, some like them crunchy, some like them soft. It’s up to you. The main thing to know about this soup is that although it is healthy only 157 calories per portion there is no sacrifice in flavour. It all honesty I really don’t think I could beat this flavour even if I added something less healthy. It is a truly delicious soup that makes you feel good just by eating it.

The Hairy Bikers got this one spot on and it is another page from the book to fold the corner for another day.