I grew tomatoes in containers on my deck for the first time this summer, and boy was I surprised at how many I got. I’ve been trying to come up with different uses for all of them and figured that it wouldn’t be right if I didn’t include fresh tomato soup in my experiments.
I scoured Pinterest for soup recipes and settled on trying a recipe from Neighbor Food called Garden Fresh Tomato Basil soup. I made some slight alterations to her recipe, using basil only as a garnish and not truly making it tomato basil soup and using a little less chicken broth than she called for. Using the cherry & grape tomatoes made this soup a little sweet and although you couldn’t identify the chicken flavor from the broth, it added a nice savory element to the soup.
Here’s what you need:
Start by dicing up a sweet onion, size doesn’t really matter as you are going to blend the soup later on. Sauté the onion in some olive oil over medium heat for about 5-7 minutes until it begins to soften and become translucent. Then add some minced garlic, balsamic vinegar, and a little sugar and sauté for another 2-3 minutes.
I grew cherry and grape tomatoes so I just sliced my tomatoes in half. If you grow or use larger tomatoes I’d roughly dice them up. I was lazy and didn’t remove the skin or seeds, which worked great because I blended the soup anyway. Add the tomatoes along with a pinch of salt and simmer for 10 minutes until softened and starting to break apart.
Pour in the chicken broth. Use more or less depending on how thick you want your soup to be. I used about ¼ cup less than what the original recipe called for, more because that is how much was in a can of chicken broth than any other reason. Simmer this for another 5 or so minutes.
Taste the soup and add salt and pepper to taste. Remove from heat and using an immersion blender, puree the soup until all the chunks are gone. If you don’t have an immersion blender – get one! Or feel free to use a real blender – remember when pureeing hot soup in a blender, remove the cap in the lid and cover with a folded towel while blending. This will prevent the steam from building up so much pressure inside that you have a tomato explosion in your kitchen. Unless of course you feel like redecorating in red.
Garnish with basil or if you are in the mood for tomato basil soup, stir some in. And don’t forget to serve it with grilled cheese for dunking. This recipe turned out just perfect the perfect thickness to coat my grilled cheese sandwich.
Feel free to head over to Neighbor Food for some good tips on freezing this soup.
- 1 T olive oil
- 1 medium sweet onion chopped
- 2 t balsamic vinegar
- 2 t sugar
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- Salt
- 4 c sliced cherry or grape tomatoes
- 1 – 14.5 oz can chicken broth
- Salt and pepper to taste
- Basil for garnish
- Heat the oil in a pot. Add the onions and sauté for 5-7 minutes until softened and translucent.
- Add balsamic vinegar, sugar, and garlic. Cook for another 2-3 minutes.
- Add the tomatoes and bring to a simmer. Cook for 10 minutes until tomatoes are soft and breaking apart.
- Stir in the chicken broth and return to a simmer. Cook for 5 minutes more. Taste and season with salt and pepper as needed.
- Puree the soup using an immersion blender or regular blender with a folded towel over the lid and the cap in the lid removed.
- Garnish with basil and serve with grilled cheese.
I’m so glad you liked this! Great tips and photos. My spicer tomatoes are about done for this year but my cherries are still going nuts. I may have to make another batch with those!