Fresh Tomato Basil Soup and Sauce in one recipe and just in time for soup season! This recipe was inspired this year by my garden. I grew tomatoes on the east side of my house and well, I ended up having a plethora of tomatoes. When you have a lot of tomatoes, you make sauce. There is nothing better than roasted tomato sauce for adding to your regular recipes and to top it off, it’s SO EASY to make. This recipe requires only a few ingredients, which you usually have on hand.
This super simple recipe involves roughly chopping up tomatoes and onions, mixing everything together in a bowl and then baking it. I love one bowl/pot recipes. Less mess and easy to do. Sign me up!
Tip: Using fresh basil is the best. In this recipe I went to my herb garden and picked a handful of basil, which worked very well for this recipe. I really like a stronger basil flavor in my sauce, so I added dried basil as well.
The beauty of this recipe is it makes two dishes in one, sauce and soup. I use the sauce for any recipe that calls for a can of crushed tomatoes or a can of tomato sauce. It’s so much better than store bought tomato sauce, because it simply has more flavor. Once the vegetables are finished roasting, remove from oven and let cool before blending and creating the soup.
The sauce freezes well, so it’s easy to store. When freezing the sauce, use a clean jar and fill jar with sauce leaving an inch of space at the top as the sauce will expand when freezing.
Fresh Tomato Basil Soup
To make this soup all you do is add some chicken bouillon. The sauce is like a soup on it’s own too. Personally, I like adding the bouillon as I feel it tastes better, but depending on the ripeness and freshness of your tomatoes, you may not have to add bouillon at all. Definitely taste your sauce before adding bouillon. Also, to create a more creamy tomato soup, you can add a bit of cream, but you really don’t need much. ⇓ Check out the recipe below for portions.
Fresh Tomato Basil Soup/Sauce
A delicious tomato soup/sauce for cooking or great on it's own.
Ingredients
Fresh Tomato Basil Sauce
- 10 cups tomatoes
- 1 large sweet onion
- 10 cloves garlic
- 1 large handful fresh basil
- 2 tbsp dried basil
- 1 tsp kosher flake salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 1/3 cup olive oil
Fresh Tomato Basil Soup
- 3 cups fresh tomato basil sauce
- 1 cup chicken/vegetable bouillon
- 1/4 cup cream (optional)
- 1 tsp honey (optional)
Instructions
Fresh Tomato Basil Sauce
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Preheat oven to 375F.
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Chop onion and tomato in large chunks (roughly 1 inch square).
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In a large bowl mix all ingredients together and pour into a large pan - I used a 9x13 baker. Bake in oven for 1.5 hours, stirring occasionally. Note: Check the sauce after an hour. Onions should be somewhat soft and there should still be some liquid in the pan. Depending on your tomatoes, an hour may be long enough. Some tomatoes will produce a lot of liquid where as some may not. If there's a lot of liquid and the onions are hard, continue cooking. Keep in mind, if you cook too long, you will end up with tomato paste, rather than sauce, which is also okay.
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Remove from oven, let cool. Blend mixture in a blender. Pour tomato sauce in jars. Freeze or can for future use. This mixture makes an excellent tomato basil soup too! I use this tomato sauce for Move Daily's African Curried Chicken Soup. It makes an already delicious soup even better!
Fresh Tomato Basil Soup
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For tomato basil soup, pour 3 cups of tomato sauce into a saucepan. Add one cup of chicken or vegetable bouillon. Heat to boiling then reduce heat to simmer for a few minutes and voila, your soup is done.
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After you've removed soup from heat, you can add the cream (or whole milk) to make more of a creamy tomato soup, but it's not necessary. Enjoy it just as it is.
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*Tip* If your soup is a little more acidic then you'd like it to be, you can add a tsp of honey to take away the "bite". Depending on the type of tomatoes you use, this is a good solution. For example, if you roast cherry tomatoes, which are typically sweeter, you likely won't need the honey. Sprinkle a little parmesan cheese on top!
