I am enjoying a bowl of this Roasted Red Pepper and Cauliflower Soup and sharing three basic (and free) tips that helped me improve my food photography blog.
This post contains affiliate links. Read the affiliate disclosure.
Three Ways To Improve Your Food Blog For Free
Tip 1: Get the Yoast SEO Plugin
I had my blog for over three years before I started using the Yoast SEO Plugin. When I reached out to Kiley at Brainchild Studios for SEO advice, this was one of the first things she said to do. It was very tedious for me to go back and fix every single post, so if you are already using Yoast, high five to you. If you’re not using Yoast, I highly recommend getting started now.
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More About Yoast
- You can start for free or upgrade to the Premium version for $89 for one site. I chose the free version to start.
- It’s super simple to install on WordPress.
- It is a very clear guide with red, orange and green indicators letting you know what’s working and what’s missing before you publish your post.
- It makes you set a focus keyword and ensures you’re using this keyword in five important areas: the heading, the title, the URL, the body content and your meta description.
- It lets you know if you’ve used the focus keyword before or not. It’s better to use a unique focus keyword for your posts. Since I share a lot of recipes, my focus keywords center around the recipe. For example, my focus keyword for this post is Roasted Red Pepper and Cauliflower Soup.
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Tip 2: Link to Internal Posts
I used to think that mentioning other blog posts within my blog would seem redundant in case readers had already read the extra post I was mentioning. But, the truth is, readers are coming to your blog at random times and are probably not familiar with a lot of your content. If someone likes your content, they will probably want to see more related articles. Linking to internal posts helps people know there’s a lot more good stuff to read in your blog and keeps them engaged longer.
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Tip 3: Separate Content with Headlines
Most people are looking for answers when they come to a blog. Separating your content with headlines and subheads makes your content easier to read so people can find what they’re looking for more quickly.
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Read More About: My Current Gear for Food Photography
Recipe Notes for Roasted Red Pepper and Cauliflower Soup
Now that I’ve shared three free tips to help improve your food blog, let’s talk about this recipe. This vegetarian soup is so simple to make, loaded with flavor and is completely dairy-free! If you can let it sit overnight, it tastes even better the next day.
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Removing the Skins from a Red Bell Pepper
You can always buy a jar of peeled, roasted red bell peppers. However, if you want to use up the ones you might still have in the fridge, I recommend roasting the red peppers and removing the outer skins. It allows the peppers to release more of their sweetness during the preparation of the soup.
- Place the red pepper over a burner set to medium-high heat.
- Using tongs, turn the bell pepper so all sides get nicely charred.
- Place the charred bell pepper in a medium bowl, tightly sealed with saran wrap and let sit for 30 minutes.
- Remove pepper from bowl and carefully scrape the outer skin off.
Happy Cooking!
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Read More About: My Butternut Squash and White Bean Soup
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Note: The beautiful plate in my photos is by Cats Eye Pottery
Roasted Red Pepper & Cauliflower Soup
Ingredients
- 1 medium head cauliflower, cut into florets
- 2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
- Salt and black pepper, to taste
- 1 yellow onion, chopped
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
- 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- 1 jar roasted red peppers, drained and chopped (19 ounces)
- 5 cups vegetable broth
- 1/2 teaspoon paprika
- 1/4 cup chopped basil
- Salt and pepper, to taste
- Optional: Microgreens, chopped basil & crispy cauliflower for garnish
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
- Place cauliflower florets on a large baking sheet and drizzle with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil. Toss and season with salt and pepper.
- Roast in the oven for 25-30 minutes, or until cauliflower is starting to brown and is tender when pierced with a fork.
- Remove the cauliflower leaving about a cup of the florets in for 10 minutes longer to get a little extra brown to use as garnish.
- Remove from oven and set the extra brown florets aside.
- In a large pot, heat the remaining tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat.
- Add the onion and cook for 3 minutes.
- Add the garlic, thyme, and crushed red pepper flakes. Cook for 2 minutes.
- Stir in the roasted cauliflower, roasted red peppers, vegetable broth, and paprika. Turn the heat to low and let the soup simmer for 20 minutes.
- Using an immersion blender or Vitamix, blend the soup until soup is creamy and smooth.
- Stir in the fresh basil.
- Season the soup with salt and pepper, to taste.
- Ladle the soup into bowls and garnish with fresh basil, microgreens and crispy cauliflower, if desired.
This post contains affiliate links which means if you click or make a purchase through my site, I might make a small commission at no extra cost to you. I only promote products that I actually use and support.
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All images ©Regan Baroni 2018.
These are amazing tips… and I LOVE the new look, feel and layout of your blog. I also think the improved printout of recipes is a MAJOR upgrade! Cheers to you rocking and rolling to always improve!
Thanks for the sweet compliments!!
I’m sure this recipe will be damn good. I just feel the aroma of roasted red pepper and that will be really yummy. Thank you so much for sharing this recipe.
It’s definitely good! If you can let it sit overnight, it will be even better the next day! Cheers!
Hi Regan, I’m a fan of your photography. I read your previous post about the change of name and the reasoning behind. I feel very related to your experience. The best in the new phase of your business.
Hi Carlos! Thank you so much for your comment and well wishes. It’s nice to know that other people can relate to these business-y things! Cheers!
All the best to you! I’ve been a fan of your work since we met at the farmers market in DG shortly after you quit your job to do this full time. Inspirational!
Hi Raina! Yes, I remember being so fresh out of the gate at that point… thank you for continuing to follow along and for the excitement for my work. I hope to see you at the DG market this summer! 🙂
Hi Regan!
Congratulations on your new and improved website. I wish you all the best of luck 🙂
Reader from Norway, Mette (at https://www.etbildeavgangen.com )
I would visit Norway in a heartbeat…top of my list. Thank you so much for your support and I hope to visit Norway someday soon… Cheers!
[…] week I shared a Roasted Red Pepper and Cauliflower Soup recipe and talked about three basic (and free) changes that you can do to improve your food blog. […]