Both Courtney and I have a massive LOVE of tomato soup. Who doesn’t?? We have a favorite place in town that we regularly drive 40 minutes out of our way just to have a bowl of their tomato soup. Well, our driving for tomato soup days are over now that we have our own version of tomato soup, and in our opinion it kicks the other soup to the curb.
So there are a few things that make this soup extra special. We added sherry to this recipe which brings in a whole new dimension of awesomeness. Don’t worry, you can still serve it to your kids, the alcohol in the sherry cooks off leaving you with an extra smooth and flavorful finish. Instead of using chicken broth we substituted with tomato juice and a couple of tablespoons of roasted chicken base. Of course a true creamy tomato soup just doesn’t exist without adding a bit of cream to finish it off at the end. If you desperately want to stay away from cream you can leave it out, but our vote on this one is to throw it in there!
With about 30 minutes from start to finish you too can now have this soup. If you were like us, driving all over town just to have that perfect bowl of tomato soup, try this! We guarantee your driving days will be over too!
- 3 Tbsp butter
- 1 Tbsp good quality olive oil
- 1 medium yellow onion, diced
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 28 oz can san marzano whole peeled tomatoes
- 40 oz tomato juice
- 3 Tbsp sugar
- 2 Tbsp chicken base - we use better than bouillon brand
- 1 tsp fresh ground pepper
- ¾ C sherry
- ¾ C heavy cream
- ¼ C chopped fresh basil - for garnish
- Heat a large dutch oven over medium heat. Add butter and olive oil, once butter is melted add diced onions. Cook onions until translucent, add garlic and cook for an additonal 2 minutes.
- Add tomatoes and tomato juice and stir. Add sugar - this is added to reduce the acidity of the tomatoes. Add chicken base, ground pepper and sherry and bring to a simmer.
- Remove from heat. Using a blender or immersion blender, blend soup until pureed. Return to pot and add cream, stir until incorporated. Garnish with chopped basil to serve.