Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup

Have you been to a local farmer's market lately?  This is one of my absolute favorites times of year.  The sun is shining, we are practically living outside, and the amount of fresh, local produce is just pure amazing!  If you wandered along the aisle at any farmers market as of late, you would have surely noticed the amazing abundance of tomatoes.  All different shapes, sizes, and colors.  Traditional and Heirloom varieties.  It makes my mouth water every time I am present at the market.  We have a little backyard urban garden with several tomato plants, and yet I still usually end up coming home from the market with more tomatoes.  My girls are slightly addicted to cherry tomatoes.  In fact, rarely do any of our garden's cherry tomatoes make it inside.  The girls just stand out there and pick and eat them.  Snack time in the garden.  I won't argue with that!

This past weekend we had a couple cooler, rainy days.  It was a nice change of pace to just snuggle on the couch with the girls and relax a bit.  I noticed though that I wanted something a little more warming for dinner.   So I decided to create a tomato soup from the fresh tomatoes we had sitting on our window sill.  It's was fabulous.  Local, fresh, and perfect for a cool, rainy Saturday evening.

Fresh Roasted Tomato Soup

~6 large tomatoes
(I used an heirloom variety along with a couple traditional varieties I had sitting on my window sill)

~1 onion, chopped
~4 cloves of garlic
~3 TBS Rice flour (or flour of choice to basically help thicken)
~2 cups of vegetable broth
~1-2 TBS Succant
~Fresh Basil to taste

• Slice tomatoes and arrange on  jelly roll pans. Add garlic. Lightly drizzle with olive oil. 
• Roast tomato and garlic mixture at 300 degrees for 1 1/2 hours.  (Enjoy the AMAZING smell!)
• Remove tomatoes from oven and allow to slightly cool
• While mixture is cooling, saute onion.  When onion begins to slightly change color, add flour and mix well.  Slowly begin adding vegetable broth until mixture becomes smooth and without lumps of flour.
• Puree tomatoes and vegetable broth mixture and succant in batches, until all combined. 
• Warm entire mixture and allow flavors to simmer. 
• Top with fresh basil (I had some purple basil left from our CSA share that week and it was divine!)

 I served this with a special treat of grilled goat cheese sandwiches.  My girls LOVED it. The freshness of the soup was unbelievable!  If another rainy, cool day settles in, I hope you and your kiddos can enjoy a garden fresh soup that warms and comforts you.  Enjoy!