Happy fall, y'all! I decided to celebrate today by making something not with pumpkin {though I've already made two things with pumpkin thus far and I am NOT SORRY}, but with soup! I have personally never liked tomato basil soup, but I was always firmly convinced that was because I had never had a good tomato soup. The canned stuff is seriously gag-worthy, and seeing as I'm not a fan, I've never really been inclined to order it at a restaurant. Last year, however, I went to lunch at a delicious cafe and my best friend talked me into getting their tomato bisque, as she used to get it all the time before she went vegan. That soup totally changed my life. IT WAS SO GOOD. I thought it was time to give tomato soup another chance.
This tomato basil soup is seriously creamy, dreamy, and SO good. To make things more difficult for myself, I decided to make pretty much the whole thing from scratch, using no cans if possible. I did end up using some tomato paste to up the tomatoey flavor, but everything else is made from good ol' fresh veggies. Tomatoes {obviously}, onions, carrots, celery, and garlic make up most of the base, along with a bit of basil and a generous glug of cream. So easy, simple, and soooo good. If you don't like tomato soup, this will almost certainly convert you.
I will, however, admit that making tomato soup from scratch is kind of a high-maintenance endeavor. Tomatoes are complicated because they have skin {gross} and seeds {even grosser}. I'm sorry but while I don't mind whole raw tomatoes, cooked tomato skin is seriously the most disgusting thing ever. Like I can't eat it without wanting to vomit. SO what you do is you have to boil your whole tomatoes for a few minutes, which causes the skin to crack and wrinkle and allows you to peel it straight off. Oh yes, that's much better. No gross tomato-skin texture around here! 🙂
Now, I'm sure you're thinking... onions and garlic are reasonable enough to put in tomato soup, but carrots and celery? What?! Well, the holy trinity of carrots, celery, and onion make up the Italian soffritto, which is a base that can make almost anything taste fantastic. I use it for my ragu sauce and in the base of a lot of my creamy soups, and it always adds a great, savory flavor! And honestly it's not even like the final product really tastes like carrots or celery specifically, it just ends up with a little somethin-somethin that tastes extra delicious.
I think it's all sorts of hilarious that I've never been a huge soup person, and for several years I had like one or two recipes for soup on this little bloggie of mine. And then inexplicably I made a bunch of soup this past year and my collection has considerably grown! We've got creamy pumpkin and creamy poblano pepper {and now we've got creamy tomato, too!}, and on the chunky side of things, we have chickpea noodle soup, italian lentil soup, chicken taco soup, and minestrone soup {made in the crockpot}. So, well, I guess now I can say I'm a soup person after all!
P.S. if you're vegan or dairy-free, I'm thinking some full-fat canned coconut milk would be the perfect substitute for heavy cream. Equally rich and creamy, and I'm quite sure the tomato/basil/spices should be plenty flavorful to mask the coconut flavor for the most part!
creamy tomato basil soup
Ingredients
- 7-8 Roma tomatoes
- 1 small white onion
- 2 medium carrots
- 4-5 cloves of garlic
- 1 rib celery
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 3-4 cups vegetable broth
- 6 oz can tomato paste
- ½ cup heavy cream more or less as needed (use canned coconut milk for a dairy-free version)
- handful of fresh basil
- salt pepper, and crushed red pepper to taste
Instructions
- First, prepare the tomatoes. Wash them, then using a sharp knife, cut a shallow X on top of each. You don't want to pierce the flesh too much, but you want to be sure to cut the skin.
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add in a pinch of salt, and add the tomatoes once it's boiling. Let the tomatoes cook 4-5 minutes, until the skin starts to crack and peel away from the tomato.
- Remove the tomatoes from the heat, and let them cool until they are cool enough to handle. Peel the skin off, then cut the tomatoes in half, and remove the seeds. Roughly chop the remaining tomato "flesh" and set aside for now.
- Wash and roughly chop the rest of the vegetables.
- Heat the olive oil in a large soup pot over medium heat until it shimmer. Add in the garlic, carrots, celery, and onion, along with some salt and pepper. Saute the veggies for several minutes, until they have softened and slightly golden.
- Add in the tomatoes, basil, tomato paste, and broth, and turn the heat down to medium low. Add a little more seasoning, cover the pot, and allow to simmer for 45-50 minutes until the vegetables are all very soft.
- Remove from heat and let cool slightly, then transfer the soup to a blender or food processor and blend until smooth.
- Return to the soup pot, stir in the heavy cream, and add more seasoning as needed. Serve immediately!
Jess @ Flying on Jess Fuel says
Ahhhh! Homemade tomato soup is incredible. This one looks SOOO good! You definitely have me in the fall mood. 🙂