Food Storage Dinner: Red Lentil Tomato Soup

Tonight for dinner I had planned to make a meal using red lentils. If you've been reading my blog, you know that I have some cases of tomato soup in my food storage that I want to use up. I did donate a case of tomato soup to Dixie Care and Share, the local food bank, but I still have a little less than a case worth in my pantry. So, I decided on Lentil Tomato Soup. There are many recipes out there using a variety of ingredients for this recipe. I decided to make this one my own, by using what I had on hand. So here it is, Red Lentil Tomato Soup:

Here are the ingredients I used.....

2 1/2 c. Chicken Broth (3 month food storage)
14 oz can Tomato Soup (3 month food storage)
1 c. red lentils, sorted and rinsed (1 year food storage)
1 TBSP Italian Seasoning (1 year food storage)
1 onion, diced
4 garlic cloves, minced

Step #1 is to sort through the lentils. I like to put mine on a white paper plate, and pick out the dark lentils and anything that is out of place. You might find little rocks or other debris. I put about 1/3 c. on the plate at a time and clean it out. One you are done, rinse all of them in a deep bowl and carefully pour the water out. Do this a few times.

I have this handy-dandy dicer, I peel the onion and cut it into smaller pieces. Then, I put it into the dicer for an easy way to dice the onions.

My parents bought this for me.... I think that they got it on one of those TV infomercials! But it is really great to dice onions with.

Here is the finished product on the onions.

Put the minced garlic and onions in a TBSP of oil and saute in a frying pan until translucent.

In a crock pot, I dumped the tomato soup, Italian seasoning, chicken broth and lentils. Add the onions/garlic to that when they are done. Do not add a can of water like you are making regular tomato soup. Pour the chicken broth into the can to rinse the can out.

It doesn't look like much initially. I cooked this on high for 4 hours. Check the moisture level occasionally, you may need to add some more water or chicken broth. I was gone for an hour toward the end of cooking so it turned out more like a stew. I picked up some artisan bread: rosemary olive oil and cut a slice to go with it. Delicious! My 16 year old son agreed that it was really good (amazing!...you know it was good if he said so!).

If you don't have tomato soup, you can substitute canned diced tomatoes with the liquid. You can use any tomato product but remember to use the same amount of liquid. Just adjust as necessary. I hope that you'll try this and let me know how you like it.