Ingredients

• 500 g fennel heads, chopped into largish chunks (with some green branches still attached, the leaves will be used for garnishing the soup)
• 500 g fresh tomatoes or 500 g canned peeled tomatoes
• 1 liter vegetable stock
• 400 g potatoes, peeled and diced
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 1 onion
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• salt & pepper, to taste
• 1 teaspoon coriander powder

Instructions

1. For all ingredients of this soup, it is nice to chop them into quite large chunks; this makes the soup look more rustic! Use your own judgment, the chunks must still be manageable in a soup, of course.

2. Chop the onion and the garlic cloves. Clean the fennel bulbs, keep the green stalks separately and chop the bulbs into sizeable chunks. Peel the potatoes, chop them into largish cubes and rinse them.

3. Heat the olive oil in a pot and lightly fry the onion and the garlic (don't let them become brown). Add potato and fennel chunks, let the vegetables simmer for approximately 5 minutes while stirring regularly. Add the vegetable stock, bring to a boil and let simmer for about 15 minutes.

4. In the meanwhile, peel the tomatoes, dice them (seeds don't need to be removed) and add them to the soup as well. (You can substitute fresh tomatoes with canned ones.) Make sure that the tomatoes get 5 minutes cooking time as well.

5. Finish the soup with 1 tsp coriander powder and some of the chopped fennel green. Add pepper and salt to taste.