Roasted Tomato Basil Soup

My momma brought Jason and me a ton of tomatoes from her garden. I was overwhelmed with tomatoes, and though it was like 100 degrees out ( but to be fair maybe only 85 near me) this past week, I thought wouldn't tomato soup taste good? I've never made it before, but it sounded like something I could do.

Mom's tomatoes

And because this blog is about baking, or putting things into the oven--- for the most part-- roasted tomato soup just sounded like I had to make it.  Yes, I would be eating soup in very warm temperatures and yes I would be turning on the oven in these very warm temperatures, but you make sacrifices for your experiments. Right?! Well then.... on to it.

My recipe is adapted from Ina Garten's Roasted Tomato Basil Soup.

Ingredients

1.5-6 ripe tomatoes, cut in half lengthwise

2.1-2 tbsp olive oil

3. A few dashes of salt

4. A few dashes of pepper

5. 1 finally chopped yellow onion

6. 5-6 garlic cloves, minced

7. 1 28 oz can tomatoes, with juice

8. 1 cup fresh basil leaves

9. 28 oz chicken stock (or veggie stock)

10. 1 tbsp butter

11.  3-4 tbsp heavy cream (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees 

2. Toss fresh tomatoes into a bowl, with olive oil and salt and pepper

3. Put tomatoes onto a baking pan and roast in the oven for 30 minutes 

4. Meanwhile, in a big soup pot, melt butter

5. Add garlic and onions to pot and cook until onions start to brown

6. Toss in the canned tomatoes and chicken stock

7. Bring to a boil and then simmer 

8. Add roasted tomatoes to the pot

9. Add basil

10. Simmer for another 20 minutes

11. Add heavy cream if desire and stir

12. Serve! (you can serve this hot or cold if you don't add the cream)

*Ina's recipe calls for 4 cups of basil.... 4 cups! I think that is 3 too many and you get a really good basil flavor with just 1 cup.

You can also puree this soup as well. I recommend not using a mixer- it won't work. It makes logical sense that it won't work, but uh- I made potato soup once and it worked well to use a hand mixer so I just assumed this would as well. I guess potatoes and tomatoes are not the same. Oops! So a word to the wise, don't do it. You will have a tomato mess. A mess so bad, it actually reminded me of the time when I was just a little girl and for whatever reason I thought it was a good idea to shake up a 2 liter of root beer before opening it. I mean, I was swinging it back and forth having a merry time.... and then.... I opened it.... and then.... there was root beer ALL over the kitchen. On the walls, the floor, the stove... you get the picture. So word to the wise, put that soup in a blender to blend or get one of those hand blenders (not mixer) to do the trick.

Now, go make some soup! It's really good.