I have been roasting tomatoes for a while now. Ina Garten has an incredible roasted tomato caprese salad. I have a roasted tomato and pablano salsa here on WyldeThyme. Tomatoes in mid winter are so ho-hum; roasting really brings out a great sweet toasty flavor from them. Add a whole head of roasted garlic and some roasted onions with just a splash of red wine… yum!
I have seen several different versions of this soup all over the food-blog world. I wanted to give this recipe a try. Something about tomato soup and grilled cheese that is total comfort food to me. Soup out of a can is ‘ok’, well for the kids anyway. But I have wanted to make a better tomato soup. Two sites: Honey and Jam and The Sophisticated Gourmet both have great recipes (oddly enough they both published them on the same day back in September too). Sophisticated Gourmet made a cheese topped toast (totally a childhood favorite of mine), which might be the reason I wanted to make tomato soup in the first place.
The weather predicted for tonight and tomorrow morning is a wintry mix of snow, hail and rain. So while everyone else in Connecticut was stocking up on milk, bread, and TP I was getting tomatoes, thyme and cippolini onions. I had tomatoes in the oven and bread dough on its first rise before the kids were home from school.
They both walked in wanting to know what smelled so good and when they would get to eat it. My son was sorely disappointed that tomatoes smelled that good (he was really looking forward to garlic bread). The house smelled amazing! When the tomatoes and garlic finished roasting I let them cool on the pan for a while then mixed them with some vegetable broth and hit them with the immersion blender.
My version is not like their version… I used wine, they used cream. But I love my version… and without the cream it has a lot less fat in it then theirs. I like that this recipe has room for whatever you want to put in. Don’t like thyme? use rosemary – or some fresh basil in the bowl. What about some oregano instead? and toss some feta and a squeeze of lemon at the end. I think there are so many versions out there because all of our taste a just a little different. I hope you like making your own version of this too. Enjoy~
- 3 lb Roma Tomatoes, halved or quartered
- 1 Head Garlic, top cut off
- 5 small Cippolini Onions cleaned, or 2 med onions quartered
- 6 – 8 spring Fresh Thyme
- EVOO
- Salt and Pepper
- 4 c Vegetable Broth
- ½ c Red Wine (optional)
- Preheat oven to 375F
- On a large sheet pan place tomatoes, head of garlic, onions and thyme. Drizzle with EVOO and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast at 375 for 1h30m – 2 h. Let cool a bit.
- in a medium stock pot place vegetable stock and wine. Add tomatoes and onions. Squeeze cloves of roasted garlic into pot and remove thyme leaves from the stems and add leaves to the pot.
- Use immersion blender to purée soup until smooth. (if you don’t have one don’t worry – transfer half the soup to a blender… and blend. Add remaining soup to blender and purée until smooth). Serve with melty cheese toasts.
- {Toast bred until very lightly toasted. Add a slice of your favorite kind of cheese to one side and put under a broiler and watch closely until melty and bubbly.}
Served in a bowl my son painted for me when he was two... so cute (and well-loved - did you see those chips?)
