I am not really a fan of tinned soups in general, I rarely find one that tastes as good as home made. Having said that, I am always willing to be proved wrong. I decided to try Sainsbury's Basics Vegetable Soup because it was just 25p for a 400g tin.


FIRST IMPRESSIONS

As this is a basic own label product, the can has a simple design with a plain orange and white label. There isn't a picture of the soup on the can so I wasn't sure how thick or chunky it was supposed to be before I bought it. I expected it to be on the thinner side because of the price. All the basic information is on the label though, including nutrition tables and it states that it is suitable for both vegetarians and vegans.

The can isn't the ring pull type, but is easy enough to open. The soup smells strongly of tomatoes, and this smell intensifies on cooking. It is pleasant but as tomato soup isn't my favourite, I did wonder how much the other vegetable flavours would come through - with good reason! At first glance, the soup did look thin, but when I poured it into a bowl, I realised that there were actually plenty of vegetable pieces that had sunk to the bottom of the can. It is an orange-red colour soup but it doesn't look as colourful or appetising as it might do because the peas and bean pieces look greyish. The carrot bits look more attractive, but it isn't the most appealing looking soup I have ever had. I added some chopped parsley to the top and this does add some contrasting colour.

Cooking the soup is as quick and easy as any other tinned soup. It takes 3 minutes to heat in a 800w microwave, and 3-4 minutes on the hob. It would be perfect to eat when you need warming up quickly. I heated mine in the microwave because I find a glass bowl easier to wash up than a saucepan. It was perfectly hot and ready to eat when the time was up.


TASTE

As I mentioned above, tomato soup is not my favourite even though I don't hate it. Like many others, this vegetable soup is tomato based. Tomato puree is actually the main ingredient bar water. I wouldn't mind this if the taste did not absolutely overwhelm all of the other vegetable flavours. I felt like I was eating tomato soup with a tomato flavoured vegetable pieces floating in it. The soup contains haricot beans, marrowfat peas, carrot, potatoes, onion, and pasta pieces, but you would scarcely know it from the taste. This is disappointing for me, because there is actually a lot of vegetables present. The pasta pieces are very small rings that are hardly noticeable. They are very soft and there aren't many pieces, so they don't add to the bulk of the soup at all. I couldn't taste any of the seasonings listed either, such as bay, celery extract and paprika. It is tomato, tomato, tomato! The other problem for me is that after having my half of the can, I felt thirsty and was left with a salty aftertaste for some time. I checked the salt content on the can and it is "orange" level using the traffic light healthy eating labelling system. In other words it has a medium salt level, but it tastes high to me. I did feel full having had half a can with some crusty bread, but I didn't feel like I had had something really nice.


WOULD I RECOMMEND THE SOUP?

If you like tomato soup more than I do, you will no doubt find this more appealing. I won't buy it again for myself, but considering the incredibly low price, it is better than I expected it to be. I thought it would contain very few vegetable pieces but there is actually plenty. In fact, half a can contains 1 of your recommended 5 a day portions of vegetables. Only natural flavours and colours have been used. The salt content is something to be aware of though. [The soup is rated "green" e.g low in the traffic light system for fat and sugar content.] I have decided to give it 3 stars, because I think it has to judged on what you can expect for the price.

[This review also appears on Ciao under my user name.]