Tomato soup & grilled cheese

I’m not sure how you’re supposed to make tomato soup, but here’s what I did.

While I made a roux, I put a can of organic tomatoes in the blender with a heaping tablespoon of julienned sun-dried tomatoes.  I added this puree to the roux and let it simmer while I made the grilled cheese.  I added salt, spices and some white wine to the soup and called it good.  When serving, I garnished it with chevre, bacon and basil.

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Tomatoes, zucchini and bleu cheese

I made this recipe some time back, I found it online somewhere. 

The recipe called for a can of fire-roasted tomatoes, but all I were regular tomatoes.  I simmered them down with some salt and dried basil.  Meanwhile, I thinly sliced two small zucchinis, lightly dusted them with flour and fried them in a cast iron with some butter and oil.  To serve, I combined them and topped it with bleu cheese, bacon, yogurt and more basil.

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Tomato & Mushroom Pasta

I started with a tablespoon of melted butter in a skillet.  To that I added a clove of crushed garlic.  Once it got really aromatic, I added a can of fire-roasted tomatoes and a can of mushrooms.  Near the end I added some basil and salt.  I served it over some ravioli and radiatorre pasta (I didn’t have enough of the ravioli).  On top I sprinkled some bleu cheese and the obligatory bacon bits.

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Tomato-Chevre Omelette

I wasn’t able to use up all of the yellow cherry tomatoes in yesterday’s gazpacho, so I decided to use the rest in a baked omelette. The omelette contained tomatoes, bacon and Chevre, with some additional tomatoes on top. I cooked the tomatoes down to concentrate them and because they were getting kind of soft.

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Gazpacho (Again)

I went out of town Saturday evening, so I picked up some yellow cherry tomatoes (sundrops, I think) to munch on during the trip. Well, I ended up with a good deal left, so I decided to make another go at gazpacho. I’m still using this recipe Creamy, Garlicky Tomato Gazpacho With Crunchy Pecori as my basic guideline.

Here it is, topped with the usual suspects (i.e. panko, bacon and Chevre) with some chives for color.

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Gazpacho

Gazpacho topped with Chevre, bacon and panko, served with a Medoc Bordeaux.

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Tortellini with Crimini & Tomatoes

I used the last of a bottle of white wine (of unknown age) to simmer some crimini mushrooms.  I added some sun-dried tomato paste, basil and salt.  When the timer went off for the tortellini, I turned off the heat under the mushrooms, added sliced grape tomatoes and covered.  It looked pretty good, but was really sour (I think the wine had turned).

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Painless tomato soup

A surprise dusting of snow overnight put me in the mood for soup. This tomato soup is just too easy.

I started with a can of diced tomatoes (they happened to be garlic-onion flavored). I puréed them in my food processor and put them on the stove to heat. I added some S&P, rosemary and thyme. At the same time, I melted 1T butter in a separate pan for the Béchamel to use to thicken the soup. After the butter started to brown slightly, I mixed in 1T of AP flour. Finally, I added 1/4 cup of milk (I wanted a thick Béchamel) and brought it to a boil. I mixed the Béchamel into the soup, and garnished with some Chevre. On the side is an Asiago-Prosciutto grilled cheese.

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Roasted tomato, walnut & Manchego salad

This salad is a combination of things that I have seen on TV and in print.

Yesterday, I cut some cherry tomatoes in half, tossed them with olive oil and roasted them at 325 deg F for about an hour.  I allowed them to cool and refrigerated them overnight.  Today, I pulverized some fresh rosemary in a mortar and pestle, chopped some walnuts, and shaved some Manchego cheese.  I tossed all of these with the tomatoes and called it a salad.  There was still enough olive oil on the tomatoes to bring it all together.

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