Tomato Basil Soup

I can recall the first time I ate tomato basil soup. It was the early 1980s when something of a country French resurgence was all the rage in the culinary world. For those of you around back then, this was the time you first learned about a delicious, savory egg dish in a flaky pie crust called Quiche, and crepe restaurants starting popping up all over the country.

A country French bistro restaurant concept called Le Madeleine, founded in 1983 in Dallas Texas with the financial backing of legendary retailer Stanley Marcus, was attracting customers by the bushel. Along with Quiche Lorraine, Tomato Basil soup was one of its signature dishes that remains on their restaurant menu today in their 60 locations throughout Texas, Louisiana, Arizona, Georgia and Washington. DC. Their first store, the one I ate at sometime after it opened, is still in operation.

For those of us who grew up in the 1950s and 60s, and believed that tomato soup was that sickeningly sweet, acidic, watery, pinkish liquid that came out of a red and white Campbell's Soup can, Le Madeleine's garden fresh tomato basil soup was a sublime discovery. Full of robust tomato flavor and seasoned with delicate hints of garlic and Parmesan cheese, then finished with a resounding garden green kick of fresh basil, their Tomato Basil soup was worth coming back for time and again.

Fast forward to 1998, and my Number One Fan bought me a cookbook as a Valentine's Day gift called Inter-Courses - an aphrodisiac cookbook published in 1997 by Martha Hopkins and Randall Lockridge. It was a bit of a tongue-in-cheek recipe book, and its book cover marketing boasts:

"Ever since Marc Anthony fist fed Cleopatra grapes, sensual foods have been intertwined with romance. Inter-Courses - an aphrodisiac cookbook follows suit, bringing more than 85 heart-melting dishes to the table, the bed or wherever one might be entertaining."

I should mention that the book is M-rated, but well written, highly stylized with glossy pages and sensuous, but tasteful photography. The recipes were not really the point of the book, but it is from these pages that we found our first Tomato Basil soup recipe, which my Number One Fan has refined over the years and made it part of her repertoire.

You can use canned tomatoes for this recipe.  Today's Con-Agra method of field processing vine ripened tomatoes gives you a consistently high quality product at an inexpensive price.  Yes, you can use fresh tomatoes, but the work would only be worth it if you are pulling them out of your garden.  You must use fresh basil, however.  Dried will not do. You can also use the fresh basil that comes in a tube, or fresh basil that is water packed, sold by Polaner.  Frankly, I stopped buying whole garlic and exclusively use the Polaner line of minced and chopped garlic, too.

Finally, you will need one of my twenty essential kitchen tools, an immersion blender, for this dish to work.  You can use a regular blender, too, but that's more work and messier. Google or Bing "immersion blender" for lots of choices on the Internet, including Cuisinart models on Amazon for about thirty bucks.

Ingredients

1 medium Vidalia, Walla-Walla, Texas 1015 or other sweet white onion, finely diced
4 tbsp garlic, minced
2-3 tbsp olive oil
1- 14.5 oz can petite diced tomatoes (like, Hunts)
2 -15 oz cans tomato sauce (like, Hunts)
1-1/2 cups chicken broth (like Swanson's)
4 oz chopped fresh basil, plus 4-6 leaves
3/4 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp anchovy paste
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese (Kraft green can)
salt & pepper to taste

The Recipe

To give you an idea of the way Inter-Courses was written, here is a sample of the introduction to this recipe from the authors:

"Jeff enjoyed his tomato-basil soup. This luscious soup offered us everything we could ever want in a tasteful prelude to an amorous evening encounter: the wonderful small of onions, garlic, and basil wafting through our home as they simmered; the smooth, rich texture and warm layers of flavor cascading from lips to tongue to throats, then bellies. Finally, the surprising sensuous effect...."

Well, you get the idea. It's a wonder these two found the time to actually cook any of the dishes they wrote about.

At any rate....

Saute the onion and garlic in the olive oil over medium heat in a soup pot until tender, but not caramelized.

Add the tomatoes and cook over medium heat for ten minutes.   Then add the tomato paste, chicken broth, cream, the fresh basil, tomato paste and anchovy paste.

Using the immersion blender, blend the ingredients until the mixture is smooth.  Simmer for another thirty minutes.

Add the Parmesan cheese, and season with salt & pepper.  Stir well to combine.

Dish up into soup bowls and garnish with the individual basil leaves and an additional sprinkle of Parmesan cheese if desired.