Ask and you shall receive... eventually

Every once in a while I check this little corner of cyberspace for comments... and once in a while I actually get one. As it is, it seems that I've been asked to provide a good animal-friendly tomato soup recipe.

On that note, please feel free to drop a line here and ask questions... whether you're looking for a specific recipe idea, something more general, info on an ingredient or technique, piece of gear, or anything in between (or even to the sides).

On to the goods, though.

The key to good tomato soup (along with just about anything else) is fresh ingredients. This means fresh tomtatoes. Sadly we're coming up on the time of year when the really good stuff just isn't available anymore. Ah well, if we didn't have out of season, we couldn't have in season, and in season really is worth it.

It's still possible to find fresh tomatoes, at least, and that's a start.

First off, a note on guestimeasuring fruits and veggies. If a recipe calls for 1 cup of chopped onion, just how many do you need to chop up? What about green pepper? Things like onions are pretty easy. If the whole vegetable looks like it's about the same size as your measuring cup, it's going to yield about that much. Hollow stuff like the green pepper... go for about half. Not an exact rule, but it'll give you an idea.

Seasoning aside (which will be pretty simple) we're only looking at a handful of ingredients. Fresh tomatoes, butter and flour for a roux, garlic and onion because I almost always use garlic and onion, sugar to cut the acidity of said tomatoes, some good fresh parmesan cheese, and a bit of heavy cream to finish. It may not sound like much, but trust me, it'll be delicious. The following is an admittedly untested version, but hey, I encourage you to put your own spin on it anyway.

4 Tbsp Butter
4 Tbsp Flour
2 clove garlic
1/2 med Onion (about 1/2 c if you prefer)
4 cups worth of whole tomato (a standard 3" globe should be around a cup's worth)
4-5 parsley stems (you bet we use the scraps)
1/4 c grated parmesan
1/4 c heavy cream
2 Tbsp Sugar
Salt & pepper

We've got the what, now for the how.

Start by melting the butter down over low heat. Once it's good and liquified you can turn it up to medium and toss in the diced garlic and onion. Saute for a few minutes until it's good and translucent. Sprinkle the flour over everything and mix it up to form a roux.

Assuming you've quartered the tomatoes, squeezed the liquidy insides out into a container and given the flesh a rough chop already you can now pour in the tomato juice (seeds are fine). You'll want to keep stirring this occasionally (your pan will thank you) and once it starts boiling let it go for a good minute while stirring. This will assure that all the starches have mixed throughout the liquid, giving you all the thickening power possible.

At this point add in the diced tomato pieces, parsley stems, and a bit of salt. All you're looking to do here is cook those tomatoes, which shouldn't take long (of course exact time depends on how large the pieces are). You can also add in the sugar. Be sure to give it a taste and make sure that you've got enough in there to cut the acidity down. Once the tomatoes are good to go, remove the pot from the heat and add the cheese. Once that's stirred in you can go ahead with the cream. Now comes the fun part.

First, take out the parsley stems and toss them in the trash - they've done their job. Now start removing the pieces of tomato from the soup into a food processor (even a blender will work... not as well, granted, but so be it). Pulse the tomatoes until they're good and pureed, adding only as much liquid as necessary (trust me, too much liquid will leave you with little bits that just swim around the bowl). Once you've got a good puree going, start adding liquid and keep going with it. You'll never get it perfectly smooth (and who would want it to be?) but you do want it to be a good uniform consistency.

Add a bit of freshly ground black pepper, and serve it up (you did double-check to make sure all of the seasonins were good, didn't you?). If you care to garnish, a bit of parmesan (in shred or flake form), a leaf or two of fresh parsley, or maybe a couple of fresh croutons will all do quite nicely.

Next time I'm at the store I'll see if I can't find any decent tomatoes to try this out. I'll let you know how it goes.