Tomato Soup with Lemon-Rosemary Cream

I'm going to cut right to the chase: This is the best tomato soup I've ever tasted. Far and away the best I've ever made. Really.

It's so strange to think that something made mostly of pantry items and low expectations can achieve greatness.



I halved the recipe to make a little over 4 cups. Didn't need tomato paste (amazingly), the can of whole tomatoes in tomato juice was enough. And it has a bay leaf in it. As in my best friend called when I was trying to fish it out and by the time we were done I'd forgotten about it and pureed the sucker. Some spoonfuls are disturbingly chunky. Oh well. Still, this is definitely a blender soup, in my opinion, so you may want to take that into account if you make a full recipe. Batches.



Plus, one day I will have a microplane grater. One day.



I'm not admitting that the carrots really helped the flavor. I'm just tipping my hat in recognition that maybe they kind of had something to do with it. Kind of. Baby steps.



Tomato Soup with Lemon-Rosemary Cream
From here

For Soup:
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
1 onion, finely chopped (If you're going to blend it, don't fuss over chopping too fine)
2 carrots, peeled, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
1 bay leaf
2 28-ounce cans crushed tomatoes with added puree
6 cups canned chicken broth

For Cream:
1/2 cup whipping cream
3/4 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary (I used crushed dried)
2 teaspoons lemon zest

1. In the soup pot, melt butter. Add next 6 ingredients. Cover and cook until onion is soft, roughly 5 minutes.

2. Add tomatoes and chicken broth. Recover and simmer until vegetables are soft, about 40 minutes.

3. FISH OUT BAY LEAF. Season with salt and pepper.

4. Feel free to skip this step. Puree until smooth in blender or food processor.

5. Whisk cream, lemon, and rosemary until slightly thickened. It says to use only half the lemon zest for the cream and put the rest in the soup. I say it's all going to get stirred into it anyways. Season with salt and pepper if you like.

Serve soup with cream drizzled over if you have company or a date (you guys constitute as my date). Otherwise, mix it all together and enjoy.