Roasted-Tomato Basil Soup

A nice thick, fresh tasting tomato soup. I thought that the tomatoes would dry more during roasting, it is hard to tell from the picture in the book. Mine were caramelizing on the bottom, but looked the same on top. I couldn’t quite come up with 4 packed cups of basil, so bought the canned tomatoes with basil. Not having a food mill, I used my immersion blender to break up the tomatoes. I love the seeds, but if you don’t you would want to use a food mill. It needs about ¼ tsp of light brown sugar per medium sized bowl of soup to cut the acid, but otherwise the recipe worked fine.

This was a very tasty soup, quite redolent of basil. I think it is a good late-summer recipe for using up the remaining basil and tomatoes in the garden. Roasting the tomatoes is a great remedy for tomatoes that didn't ripen fully. Contrary to what Ina says, I don't think you could make this all winter long, as fresh basil isn't available/cheap then, although I suppose you could substitute frozen, pureed basil. I halved the amounts and still made enough soup for three or four meals, so some will go in the freezer.