Roasted Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese

When it starts getting cold outside I constantly crave soups and stews. They just seem to warm me up in a way other hot foods just cannot. After going to South Philly Taproom and enjoying their fabulous tomato soup, I decided to create my own tomato soup. This is only the second time I’ve made tomato soup, because the first time I made it, it just tasted like sauce, the key for me is using butter or a butter substitute instead of olive oil, adding brown sugar and milk, because that’s what distinguishes it from sauce.

Roasted Tomato Soup

3 cans of fire roasted diced tomatoes and the juice (the ones I bought also had roasted garlic in it)

1 can of diced tomatoes

3 tbs of butter

½  a medium onion (more if your roasted tomatoes didn’t include onion)

5 cloves of garlic (more if your roasted tomatoes didn’t include garlic)

A pinch of Italian seasoning

¾ of a bottle of beer

A few tbs of brown sugar to your liking to bring out the sweetness in the tomatoes

3 cups of milk

S & P to taste

Start by sautéing the onions and garlic in butter. Once these are lightly browned add in your canned tomatoes, Italian seasoning, beer, brown sugar, salt and pepper and simmer for 30 minutes. Then puree your soup with either an immersion blender or a regular blender. Add in Milk and simmer for another 15 minutes. Now you have a quick and easy tomato soup! Serve with grilled cheese and a beer of course!

For the grilled cheeses

I used Rosemary Bread from Whole Foods for mine with Colby and Munster Cheeses. For Dom’s I used Whole Foods French banquette and the same cheeses.