Easy From-Scratch Tomato Soup

Man, has life been hectic around here lately. Jonathan and I have been home so infrequently that we have fruits and veggies piling up, uneaten. I'm doing my best to come up with fun ways to use them up as quickly as possible. One of our biggest fridge-occupiers this week were tomatoes. I know, I know. How can I complain about that? Any day now, I'm sure I'll wish I had a fridge full of fresh tomatoes and other late-summer goodies to contend with. Fall and winter are finally just around the corner!

This is what I made for dinner last night with our bountiful tomatoes:

I made this with a mixture of roma tomatoes and heirloom tomatoes, and it tasted great. I cut the huge heirloom tomatoes into pieces about the size of the roma tomatoes so that they'd cook evenly. The roma tomatoes were cooked whole. Make sure to use a blender pitcher that is glass or otherwise heat-proof!

Easy Tomato Soup (makes 2 bowls)

-enough fresh tomatoes or tomato chunks to loosely fill a 13 x 9" baking dish

-4 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed

-olive oil

-1/4 cup (loosely packed) fresh basil leaves, torn

-salt and pepper to taste

1) Pre-heat oven to 400.

2) Coat bottom of baking dish with small amount of olive oil.
3) Place tomatoes and garlic in dish. Sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper.

3) Roast in oven 30 minutes.

4) Carefully transfer contents of dish to blender.

5) If you want to blend the basil into the soup, also add it to the blender at this time. (Otherwise, add basil to the individual bowls at the end, give a quick stir, and let sit a minute before serving.)

6) Blend until smooth, working in batches if necessary.

7) Pour into bowls and serve with grilled cheese. Nom, nom!