Get Fresh in your Kitchen

This is my favorite tomato soup recipe and it is so simple and freezes well. I make this soup when the tomatoes are ripe and can enjoy it all fall and winter long. Serve this up with your version of toasted cheese and you have a meal that not only comforts but tastes like a Fresh tomato straight from the garden even when those tomatoes are not in season. The excess onion and carrots are perfect to add to tomato sauce and it great flavor instead of tossing when finished.

Tomato Soup
3 tablespoons good olive oil
1½ cups chopped red onions (2 onions)
2 carrots, unpeeled and chopped
1 tablespoon minced garlic (3 cloves)
4 pounds vine-ripened tomatoes, coarsely chopped (5 large)
1½ teaspoons sugar
1 tablespoon tomato paste
¼ cup packed chopped fresh basil leaves
3 cups chicken stock 
1 tablespoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
¾ cup heavy cream
Julienned fresh basil leaves, for garnish

Heat the olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pot over medium-low heat. Add the onions and carrots and sauté for about 10 minutes, until very tender. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Add the tomatoes, sugar, tomato paste, basil, chicken stock, salt, and pepper and stir well. Bring the soup to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer, uncovered, for 30 to 40 minutes, until the tomatoes are very tender.

Add the cream to the soup and process it through a food mill into a bowl, discarding only the dry pulp that’s left. Reheat the soup over low heat just until hot and serve with julienned basil leaves and/or croutons.