Creamy Tomato Soup

It's been freezing lately. And I don't mean to-be-expected-in-December freezing, but holy-crap-cover-every-inch-of-your-skin freezing. I am a big fan of soup as it is, and the cold weather was a perfect opportunity to play around with my immersion blender. I was craving a homemade creamy tomato soup that wouldn't take an hour to simmer (Ash is working nights--we don't have that kind of time right now) like most of my other soups, so I hit the internet to see what I could find. I REALLY wanted to eat it in a big bread bowl, but the store was all out of any kind of bowl-worthy bread. (Apparently I was not the only one craving soup in a bread bowl.)

I am always hesitant with using canned tomatoes in soup, as I am convinced that sometimes they taste like tin. However, the tomatoes in the grocery store looked like they had seen better days, so I didn't have much of a choice. (And I'll be honest--it actually worked out just fine!) I wanted a recipe with everyday ingredients (the whole herbs in kitchen twine thing is fun and all, but only on special occasions when I'm not super lazy), and something super easy. Below is what I ended up doing...

Creamy Tomato Soup (with an Immersion Blender)

1 large can crushed tomatoes
8 basil leaves, chopped (some extra to garnish, if you want)
2 bay leaves
3 tablespoons butter (I've tried olive oil before...not as good, but not bad)
1 large onion, roughly chopped
3 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
About 12 oz. of vegetable stock
Approximately 1/3 cup of heavy cream (you could probably do milk and thicken with cornstarch or flour, but I didn't try that--I wanted a TRULY creamy soup)
Pinch of sugar
Salt and black pepper to taste

Saute the onions and garlic in 1 tbsp. butter. When translucent, add the bay leaves, crushed tomatoes and vegetable stock. After it boils, remove from heat, remove the bay leaves (if you used dried ones) and and use an immersion blender to blend until there are no large lumps left (about 1 minute). Return to heat, and when it returns to a boil, add the the fresh basil, the remaining 2 tbsp. of butter, the heavy cream, pinch of sugar, and salt and pepper to taste. (I also threw in some italian seasoning, but I am a bit heavy handed with the spices.) You can also add more stock if you prefer a thinner soup--I left this one thick so it was more of a tomato bisque.

When serving it, I grated in some fresh parmesan cheese, threw in a few more pieces of basil and served it with croutons. The whole process probably took about 30 minutes, and Ash gave it two thumbs up! :-) (If I had thought of it at the time, I would've taken a picture...oops!)

Apparently the sugar is supposed to cut the acidity of the canned tomatoes, but I just ended up adding more salt. So, over to you if you want to add it or not. I'll probably omit it when I make it again.

If you don't have an immersion blender, seriously, don't use this recipe. You can probably wait for the whole thing to cool a bit, then place it in a regular blender, then throw it back into the pot, but that's a whole lot of trouble. I love my immersion blender--it turns anything into a nice soup in about 2 minutes flat, so if you love soup, I highly recommend one. (Though you'll be on a smoothie and soup kick for the next month--you've been warned.)

Enjoy!