Garden Tomato Soup

Its a cold, snowy day in mid-April and my girls are home from school for yet another snow day. This weather has us thinking about warm soup and hot sandwiches. We decided to make some tomato soup since we still have so many canned garden tomatoes on our shelf.

Tomatoes grew very well in the garden last year. We were harvesting tomatoes into November!

I researched lots of different soup recipes online and came up with a combination of ingredients that are delicious! Here's our recipe:

Ingredients:

2 quarts of canned tomatoes (ours are San Marzano tomatoes)
1 medium onion, diced (from our garden)
1 clove of chopped garlic
2 cups chicken broth (made from out broiler chickens)
3 tbsp olive oil
1/2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 bay leaf
1 tbsp basil
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

Roux:
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour

Directions:

1. Heat olive oil in a large saucepan and saute garlic and onion until soft and translucent. Season with salt and pepper.

2. Add the tomatoes and chicken stock. Stir this well and then bring to a boil. Let this boil for about 20 minutes. You want the flavors to combine and the tomatoes to soften a bit.

3. Reduce the heat and add a bay leaf, balsamic vinegar, and basil. All to simmer for a few more minutes. Meanwhile, make the roux in a separate pan.

4. Remove the bay leaf. Use a submersible blender to combine all the ingredients.

5. Add the roux to your tomato soup and whisk until well-blended.

6. Stir in the heavy cream and add additional salt and pepper to taste.

Serve and Enjoy!

The girls and I thought this tomato soup pared up nicely with a hot grilled cheese sandwich.  It was a perfect lunch for a snowy day. And it always feels great to feed my family using high quality food right from our own yard!

Grilled cheese and tomato soup - yum!