Hello again! I’m so glad to be back with you after my little hiatus. Thanks for being here!
Today, I am continuing my tribute to hospital food. In yesterday’s post, I shared that I recently returned from Texas where I was helping out while my dad was in the hospital. He was quite ill for several days, but a turning point came when he was finally able to eat some real food. The first thing he was able to eat was a bowl of pureed chicken-noodle soup for lunch. For dinner that evening, the nutritionist brought in a bowl of tomato-basil soup that actually smelled really good. To my and my mom’s delight, dad drank it down and said that it tasted good! Hallelujah!
When I got back to my home in California, I decided to crack open one of the jars of tomatoes I canned with my friend Em back in September, and make my own Stone Soup-style tomato-basil soup. If you missed the post where I canned the tomatoes with Em, you can click here to see it. We had a wonderful day picking tomatoes out of her little backyard farm and then canning them while they were still warm from the late-summer sunshine.
For the soup, I started by sautéing a shallot and a clove of garlic in butter. I made a roux and added a little chicken stock (you could use vegetable stock, also). I added the tomatoes, let the whole thing simmer for a couple of minutes and then used my immersion, hand-held blender to puree the whole lot of it. The resulting soup tasted like liquid sunshine–deep, rich tomatoey-sweet and zingy. On top of the soup, I drizzled a little of the sweet basil pesto I had made at the end of the summer and frozen for future use. It was absolutely delicious–and the best part? The whole recipe takes about 10–ok 15 because you’ll have to read the recipe–to make this soup.
Now–I used tomatoes I canned from a backyard farm and homemade pesto–but there are plenty of good options for store-bought tomatoes and pesto out there. Here are a couple:
Sanmerican, or SMT tomatoes come in cans or in these great little cartons. They come diced, whole and pureed. They are the traditional San Marzano tomatoes and are packed with fresh, zesty, tomatoey flavor. The tomatoes have a firm texture and are good right out of the package. They’re readily available in markets everywhere.
There are pre-made pestos that you can get in the refrigerator section at your local market–I have unfortunately found them to be of varying quality. I actually like this shelf-stable pesto better than most other options:
I found this one during the pandemic when I couldn’t get to the market. I ordered it on-line from a gourmet food store and it is surprisingly good–well-balanced and full of fresh flavors. I used it on a variety of things: pizza, soups, pasta. I know you can order it on-line, but I think Safeway actually carries it, too.
Another popular item on the hospital food trays, especially for lunch, was sandwiches. And what’s better with tomato soup than a grilled cheese sandwich? Tune in tomorrow to see my super-simple recipe for the best grilled cheese sandwich EVER. Until then,
Peace, love and good food,
Keri
