Sweet Tomato Soup

Okay.  So this is totally a very involved tomato soup.  (Read: you're going to need a full morning to get this done).  But, I promise, the rewards are so much bigger than the time you will put into this soup.

Let me tell you a story about little Heather: she hated all things tomato.  Every single tomato piece that I could see was picked out of everything that I ate.  I could eat pureed tomatoes (ketchup, spaghetti sauce) but if there were chunks of tomato, I had to pick them out.  I wouldn't eat them in BLT's and don't get me started on tomato soup.  I was always the last one sitting at the table on tomato soup night, crying and trying to choke down the soup so that I could be excused from the table.  It was not a pretty sight and chock full of all of the drama I could muster.  I'm sure my mom wondered where this picky, annoying child came from.

And then, suddenly, my tastes started to change.  Well, really only the tomato soup thing changed (I picked tomatoes out of things I ate until I got pregnant and then I suddenly loved tomatoes.  Go figure.).  When I was in college I tried my mom's tomato soup again and I fell in love with it.  It doesn't really taste like tomatoes, more like a somewhat sweet pink-colored vegetable soup.  I still don't buy tomato soup in a can; if I want tomato soup I either pull some of this goodness out of my freezer, or I get to work making it because, for me, there is no alternative to homemade tomato soup.

This recipe makes 4 tomato soup bases.  Freeze them in 2 cup increments (I use old cottage cheese containers or ziplock freezer bags), then when you're ready, pull the base out and slow thaw it over low heat until the base is melted, add 2 cups of milk and a bit of thickener and you have easily the most delicious tomato soup ever slurped.  The taste changes when I make the base in the winter, because the tomatoes aren't as sweet, but throughout the summer when you have an abundance of tomatoes in your garden (or your mom's garden, which is where mine came from this fall) or at the farmer's market, take a morning to stock your freezer up for a rainy, or in my case, a snowy day.

Tomato Soup Base

(makes about 4 bases; 2 cups each)

Nutrition facts (Each base, made with 2 cups of 2% milk, is about 4 servings), Per serving: 170 calories | 5.9 g. fat | 22.8 carbs | 6.4 g. protein | 3.1 g. fiber | about 5 WWP

• 6 lbs ripe tomatoes
• 1 ½ lbs assorted multi-colored peppers
• ½ bunch celery, chopped (about 6 stalks)
• 3-4 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped*
• 3-4 cloves of garlic
• ¼ cup butter, melted
• ¼ cup flour
• ¼ cup sugar
• 1/8 cup salt 

Seed the tomatoes and the peppers.  Tear them into large chunks and add to a stock pot along with the celery, carrots, onion, and garlic. Simmer all the vegetables until soft and a liquid forms.  Once the vegetables are all soft, blend them until they are smooth.  You can use a blender, food processor, or an immersion blender.

Once the vegetables are blended together, strain to separate the juice.  You can do this one of two ways:

1. The easiest way is to just bypass the blending step above and use a juicer instead.  It will blend your veggies and extract the juice, which is what you want, all in one simple step.  
2. I do not have a juicer, so I do it the somewhat more time-consuming way – I get some cheese cloth from the fabric store (really cheap; I have a lot on hand), cut 2 nice big squares and layer them together, then I ladle about 2 cups of the vegetables into the cheese cloth.  Working over a fine mesh sieve, I squeeze out all of the juice and discard the leftover vegetable pulp.  Repeat this process until all the juice is out of all of the pulp. The vegetables will be hot, so let them cool to room temperature before you start straining or you will burn your hands as you squeeze out the juice.

After you have all of the juice squeezed out, you should have about 8 cups or so of really pretty red liquid.  At this point, wash your stock pot and put that liquid back into it and bring it up to a very low simmer.  Blend together the melted butter, flour, sugar and salt.  Add it to the strained tomatoes and whisk to blend.

Allow mixture to cool to room temperature.  Ladle 2 cups of vegetable liquid into freezer bags (you should get about 4 bags or 2 cups each) and lay them flat to freeze completely.

When you’re ready to make the soup, simply pull one of your frozen bases out of the freezer and melt it down in a saucepan slowly over very low heat.  Once the base is completely liquid, add 2 cups of milk and cook until heated.  Do not boil.  If you’d like a little bit thicker soup, which I do, bring the soup to a low simmer after you've added the milk, and then add another mixture of the melted butter, flour, and sugar to the simmering soup.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

*You can use yellow, red or half of each – I use whatever I happen to have on hand.  

Okay.  So this is totally a very involved tomato soup.  (Read: you're going to need a full morning to get this done).  But, I promise, the rewards are so much bigger than the time you will put into this soup.

Let me tell you a story about little Heather: she hated all things tomato.  Every single tomato piece that I could see was picked out of everything that I ate.  I could eat pureed tomatoes (ketchup, spaghetti sauce) but if there were chunks of tomato, I had to pick them out.  I wouldn't eat them in BLT's and don't get me started on tomato soup.  I was always the last one sitting at the table on tomato soup night, crying and trying to choke down the soup so that I could be excused from the table.  It was not a pretty sight and chock full of all of the drama I could muster.  I'm sure my mom wondered where this picky, annoying child came from.

And then, suddenly, my tastes started to change.  Well, really only the tomato soup thing changed (I picked tomatoes out of things I ate until I got pregnant and then I suddenly loved tomatoes.  Go figure.).  When I was in college I tried my mom's tomato soup again and I fell in love with it.  It doesn't really taste like tomatoes, more like a somewhat sweet pink-colored vegetable soup.  I still don't buy tomato soup in a can; if I want tomato soup I either pull some of this goodness out of my freezer, or I get to work making it because, for me, there is no alternative to homemade tomato soup.

This recipe makes 4 tomato soup bases.  Freeze them in 2 cup increments (I use old cottage cheese containers or ziplock freezer bags), then when you're ready, pull the base out and slow thaw it over low heat until the base is melted, add 2 cups of milk and a bit of thickener and you have easily the most delicious tomato soup ever slurped.  The taste changes when I make the base in the winter, because the tomatoes aren't as sweet, but throughout the summer when you have an abundance of tomatoes in your garden (or your mom's garden, which is where mine came from this fall) or at the farmer's market, take a morning to stock your freezer up for a rainy, or in my case, a snowy day.

Tomato Soup Base

(makes about 4 bases; 2 cups each)

Nutrition facts (Each base, made with 2 cups of 2% milk, is about 4 servings), Per serving: 170 calories | 5.9 g. fat | 22.8 carbs | 6.4 g. protein | 3.1 g. fiber | about 5 WWP

• 6 lbs ripe tomatoes
• 1 ½ lbs assorted multi-colored peppers
• ½ bunch celery, chopped (about 6 stalks)
• 3-4 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped*
• 3-4 cloves of garlic
• ¼ cup butter, melted
• ¼ cup flour
• ¼ cup sugar
• 1/8 cup salt 

Seed the tomatoes and the peppers.  Tear them into large chunks and add to a stock pot along with the celery, carrots, onion, and garlic. Simmer all the vegetables until soft and a liquid forms.  Once the vegetables are all soft, blend them until they are smooth.  You can use a blender, food processor, or an immersion blender.

Once the vegetables are blended together, strain to separate the juice.  You can do this one of two ways:

1. The easiest way is to just bypass the blending step above and use a juicer instead.  It will blend your veggies and extract the juice, which is what you want, all in one simple step.  
2. I do not have a juicer, so I do it the somewhat more time-consuming way – I get some cheese cloth from the fabric store (really cheap; I have a lot on hand), cut 2 nice big squares and layer them together, then I ladle about 2 cups of the vegetables into the cheese cloth.  Working over a fine mesh sieve, I squeeze out all of the juice and discard the leftover vegetable pulp.  Repeat this process until all the juice is out of all of the pulp. The vegetables will be hot, so let them cool to room temperature before you start straining or you will burn your hands as you squeeze out the juice.

After you have all of the juice squeezed out, you should have about 8 cups or so of really pretty red liquid.  At this point, wash your stock pot and put that liquid back into it and bring it up to a very low simmer.  Blend together the melted butter, flour, sugar and salt.  Add it to the strained tomatoes and whisk to blend.

Allow mixture to cool to room temperature.  Ladle 2 cups of vegetable liquid into freezer bags (you should get about 4 bags or 2 cups each) and lay them flat to freeze completely.

When you’re ready to make the soup, simply pull one of your frozen bases out of the freezer and melt it down in a saucepan slowly over very low heat.  Once the base is completely liquid, add 2 cups of milk and cook until heated.  Do not boil.  If you’d like a little bit thicker soup, which I do, bring the soup to a low simmer after you've added the milk, and then add another mixture of the melted butter, flour, and sugar to the simmering soup.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

*You can use yellow, red or half of each – I use whatever I happen to have on hand.