There are soup cans in the supermarket for less than £1, but you only get one portion.

The benefit of making soup at home is that the portion tends to be fairly large, so now I have leftover tomato soup that can be eaten for another day.

Wanting to use up the carrots I bought over Christmas, I was surprised to learn that Jamie Oliver's tomato soup contains carrots, so it was the ideal recipe to try.

While the warming mouthful of tomato soup was pleasing indeed, the process would have been a lot neater with the addition of one item – a handheld blender.

For me, I had to transfer the soup from the pan into a plug-in blender, and it caused unnecessary spillage, so I will be adding one to my kitchen essentials.

Jamie Oliver's tomato soup recipe

Takes: 45 minutes

Serves: six portions

Ingredients

Two carrots

Two sticks of celery

Two medium onions

Two cloves of garlic

Olive oil

Two chicken or vegetable stock cubes

Two x 400g tins of plum tomatoes

Three large ripe tomatoes

Half a bunch of fresh basil (15g)

Method

Peel and roughly slice the carrots and onions, and slice the celery and garlic. Heat two tablespoons of oil in a large pan over a medium heat, add all the prepped ingredients, then cook with lid ajar for 10 (or 15) minutes.

Crumble the stock cubes into a jug, cover with 1.5 litres of boiling water, and stir until dissolved. Add the stock to the pan with tinned and fresh tomatoes, including the green stalks.

Stir and bring to the boil, then reduce to a simmer for 10 minutes with the lid on.

Meanwhile, pick the basil leaves. Remove the pan from the heat. Season with sea salt and black pepper, then stir through the basil leaves. Using a stick blender, pulse the soup until smooth. Season to taste, then serve.