Sunday Soup: Fresh Tomato Basil Bisque

Happy New Year everyone!  This is a little late but I came down with a nasty little tummy bug that left me with zero blogging energy.  Then by the time I felt better I was off to a three day conference in Sandusky.  Hope you all had wonderful New Years celebrations and have stayed warm with the recent crazy weather we've had!  Anyways, it's been awhile since I posted a Sunday Soup so why not start off a new year of blogging with it!

For some reason I have a major aversion to regular tomato soup.  I mean can you blame me?  Soup that you could make by essentially watering down ketchup, blech.  But when a tomato basil bisque is presented to me I'm a pretty big fan.  Probably because it has a little more texture and the really good ones are made with delicious cream (hey hey chubby soup, where did that wedding diet go?).  So when we got these super cool (or should I say SOUPER cool?  Hah man the corny never stops here!) soup and sandwich plates I was inspired to make soup!  Chris' mom got us these soup and sandwich plates for Christmas from uncommon goods.  Chris is a big grilled cheese and tomato soup fan although our recent dieting has curtailed our bread purchases, but ANYWAYS, back to the soup.

I stumbled upon this recipe through Kitchen Daily and decided to give it a whirl since it sounded nice and fresh without the added calories of heavy cream.  Although tomatoes aren't really in season right now I figured it was still worth a shot.

Fresh Tomato Basil Bisque
(about 3 servings)

 Ingredients:
- 3 large tomatoes, diced (you could also use a can of diced tomatoes)
- 1 c. yellow onion, diced
- 1 Tbsp. garlic, minced
- 1/2 c. fresh basil, roughly chopped
- 32 oz. chicken stock
- extra virgin olive oil (about a Tbsp.)
- pinch red pepper flakes
- sprinkle of parmesan for topping

Instructions:
- In a large pot, heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add onions and let cook until translucent (4ish minutes).

- Add garlic and let cook about a minute.
- Add chicken stock, tomatoes and basil then season with salt, pepper and red pepper flakes.  Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer for 30 minutes.

- Use an immersion blender to blend the soup so there's no more large chunks.  This is just preference, you don't have to blend it if you don't want.

- Serve and enjoy!

This turned out really yummy with a nice little kick to it (I might have been a little heavy handed on the pepper flakes)!  Definitely a good replacement for that condensed stuff and there's no cream in it.  I wish it made a larger batch so in the future I'll double it when making for lunches.  But if you are looking for enough for one meal than this will be just fine.  It was also pretty easy, didn't really require a lot of ingredients or effort.

Well it's time to kick off red carpet season with the Golden Globes so stay tuned for a glamorous cocktail and a review of the red carpet fashions!

Cheers!
Steph