Homemade Tomato Soup With Zucchini-parmesan Croutons
Why I Love This Recipe
After probably the longest and hottest day of pastry class, I ran home, put my Marjolaine in the fridge, showered, then headed back to the final hour of the Union Square farmers market. When I got there it hot, sticky, crowded, and there were seemingly miles of tomatoes. Big, small; heirloom, roma, cherry; red, yellow, green; you name it they were there.
With my new lot of red treats I decided to do a couple of things:
1. Roast some of the smaller ones for use tomorrow.
2. Make a delicious homemade tomato soup! It even has a "healthy" crouton treat that will remind you of that good old grilled cheese and tomato soup that you might have enjoyed as a kid.
Ingredients You'll Need
2 TBSP olive oil
2 garlic cloves, pressed
8 fresh, large roma tomatoes, diced
1 cup water
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup marinara sauce (I didn't have tomato paste)
1 TBSP white vinegar
1 tsp sugar
dash of tabasco sauce
salt, pepper, onion powder, italian seasoning to taste
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 F.
For the soup, put oil and garlic in pan over medium-high heat. Add your diced tomatoes, vinegar, seasonings, sauce/paste, rest of olive oil, and tabasco. Simmer for about 25-30 minutes over Medium-Low heat until tomatoes are soft and the liquid has reduced a little bit.
Remove from heat. After mixture has cooled for a couple of minutes, carefully blend in a mixer (I used the "stir" function and it was more than fine.) Be careful when mixing hot liquids, they tend to spout up...slow is best. When you've reached a nice puree, pour the soup through a strainer into a large bowl and set aside.
For the croutons, slice a zucchini or green squash into rounds about 1" thick. Brown on both sides in a pan with some oil. In the meantime shred some parmesan cheese (about 1 cup). When the rounds are brown on both sides, move to a baking sheet (you can drain on a paper towel first if you want). Top each "crouton" with shredded cheese and bake in the oven at 350 F until melted.
Serve tomato soup with crouton in the center cheese side up; drizzle fresh olive oil (an herb flavored olive oil or regular, either works) around the crouton. We added extra croutons...they were so good!
