I don’t know how many tomato recipes I have, but it’s a bunch. A handful of them are tomato soup recipes. Nearly all of those work fine with good quality canned tomatoes, but I have two tomato soup recipes that absolutely require fresh summer tomatoes. Gazpacho, and this one: Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup.
I know some people don’t like soup in the summer, but I am quite happy with any number of summer soups, and I know I’m not alone. Gazpacho is served chilled, but I serve Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup warm to hot, in the kitchen or the dining room, where there’s air conditioning. I like it with a green salad, or a slice of quiche, or chicken salad on crackers. But perhaps my favorite way to eat it is with leftover cold Roast Chicken, pesto sauce, and hunks of French bread. (And I won’t lie–I’ve also enjoyed it more than once with leftover cheese enchiladas.)
Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup is really easy, but it takes a little planning and a blender or food processor. The fresh tomatoes roast in a 275° oven for a couple of hours. You roast them unpeeled, and then throw them, skins and all, into the food processor or blender, and you’d never know the tomatoes AND tomato skins went into the soup. While the tomatoes are slow-roasting, I like to caramelize the onions in olive oil so they’ve taken on a nice sweet depth of flavor. That takes about half an hour. Neither of these cooking steps require much work to speak of, just a little half-a**ed attention and really only while cooking the onions. (I.e., you’re going to need to cruise past the stove and stir the onions around a few times.) Other than that you’ll need a little vegetable stock or chicken stock or water with some bouillon cubes, a bit of seasoning, a few leaves of basil, and that’s it! The time and effort are well worth it, I promise. You’ll be giving Campbell’s the side-eye from now on.
Like so many soups, Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup benefits from a little resting time to allow the flavors to develop. Chilled overnight is great, but I know a good trick to speed this soup toward that second-day flavor, and it’s so easy! Make your Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup early in the day, and then leave it in the covered soup pot on the back of the cold stovetop to cool for an hour or so. After that you can put it in the refrigerator or reheat it for serving.
Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup
Ingredients
- 3 lbs. fresh tomatoes
- olive oil for drizzling and sautéing
- salt and pepper
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 t. Italian seasoning
- 1 t. dried basil
- 2 cups vegetable stock or chicken stock
- fresh basil for garnish
Instructions
- Cover a sheet pan with foil or parchment. Preheat oven to 275°.
- Core the tomatoes and slice in half. Put the tomatoes on the sheet pan, cut side up. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast for 2 to 2½ hours. Tomatoes with have shrunk considerably and the flavors will be concentrated.
- While the tomatoes are cooking, slowly sauté the onions in a little olive oil over medium low heat until they are carmelized. This will take about half an hour. You can simply turn the heat off and let the onions rest on the stove until the tomatoes are ready. I use my soup pot to cook the onions so I don't mess up another pan.
- When both the onions and tomatoes are done cooking, scrape them and any residual cooking oils into a food processor or blender and process until smooth. Add the tomato and onion purée to your soup pot. Add the Italian seasoning and dried basil. Whisk in the stock and bring to a simmer. Turn the heat to low and simmer for about 20 minutes.
- Serve!
Fresh tomatoes make this soup,
But I’ve also used frozen ones and it still tasted delicious.