Tried and tested: Heinz's souped up new soups

by Jennifer Howze

Tinned soup - it lurks in practically every cupboard in the nation, but are we excited about eating it tonight? Not really. But now Heinz hopes to liven things up with its revamped range of soups, with new labels and nine new recipes.

The new soup recipes build on tried-and-tested ingredients like tomato and chicken, and incorporate jazzier flavours like chilli, lemon grass, rosemary and ginger. Working with cookbook writer and former project manager at the Good Housekeeping Research Institute Liz Trigg, Heinz says they have developed varieties that taste less processed and more contemporary. Equipment had to be recalibrated to cope with the different ingredients, including more parsnips for the spicy parsnip soup, all in an attempt to make it taste closer to homemade. 'Every ingredient can be found in most cupboards or bought at your local supermarket,' says Trigg.

In fact, Heinz was so confident about its soup recipes that it invited iVillage, along with some other members of the food press, to make two soups using its new recipes and compare those fresh ones with the tinned varieties.

So iVillage and friends donned aprons, chopped and stirred, and cooked up pots of Spicy Butternut Squash and Carrot and Ginger Soup - and it was my first time to ever make soup from scratch. We poured the finished versions into side-by-side bowls and dipped in our spoons. And what were the results?

Well, closer than you might think. Keep in mind that the only ingredient listed for the tinned soup that was not in our home-made versions was modified cornstarch, which is added as a thickener. Interesting was the variation between the homemade versions. Three of us had made the carrot soup, and although we had all stood side and side and added virtually the same amount of the same ingredients at the same times to our pots, you could taste a difference. Frankly, my version of carrot and ginger soup - revealing my lack of culinary instinct, perhaps - wasn't quite as good as the Heinz tinned version. Theirs tasted richer and was less runny. But another woman's carrot and ginger version was amazing - spicy ginger, sweet carrot flavour. You would hardly expect a tin of soup to compete.

The competition was keener with the butternut squash soup. The tinned version was smoother - which can be a plus or a minus, depending on how chunky you like your soup. Both versions were yummy, with a nice taste of squash with just a bit of zing from chilli.

In both cases, I could imagine either buying the soup off the shelf or making the recipe myself. And you can do the same. Make up one of Heinz new specialty soups from the recipes below or pick one up from your local shop. Or, if you're curious, do a taste comparison like we did. You might be surprised.

Heinz soups retail from 59p for classics like Cream of Tomato and Vegetable to 79p for the Special Soup range, and are available at most supermarkets.

Details are correct at time of publication