Homestyle Creamy Tomato Soup...from Scratch

I LOVE creamy tomato soup! 

This is a hardy recipe that can be found in my cookbook - Recipes & Recollections from The Better Baker - because I love it so much. 

It's easy too. Can be easily doubled for larger families.  Takes only a few ingredients - use what you have on hand.

A dear friend fixed this for company once and told me 'That is the BEST tomato soup I have ever had'! *-*

(Hover over imagine to pin) 

I used low sodium canned tomato soup, 1/3 reduced fat cream cheese, and fat free 1/2 & 1/2 instead of milk. 

You could also use fat free cream cheese (just remember - it has more water, so when it is beaten {or food processed} it tends to make everything runnier).

A grilled cheese sandwich is the perfect accompaniment along side this yummy soup. MMMMMM!!

When tomatoes are in abundance in the summertime, I freeze them whole(washed but unpeeled)...put several in a freezer bag and throw them in. 

When I'm ready to use them for cooking, I let them thaw first, and the peel comes right off.

Because we had recently cleaned out our big freezer (OH how nice to know what's really in there!) we found a bag of tomatoes, I brought them to the kitchen to thaw and didn't even have to think of what I would make with them.

If using a can of tomatoes, I recommend saving the juice first, and adding it to the soup at the end for consistency. 

I like mine thick, so I only added a little bit of juice to the soup before serving.  But you can add more juice to stretch the soup too - just do your thing! 

Do hope you'll try this tummy-warming and tastebud-satisfying dish.

HOMESTYLE CREAMY TOMATO SOUP

1/2 onion, chopped

1 TB. butter or margarine

1 (14 ozs) can diced tomatoes

1/2 c. milk

1 (10 oz) can condensed tomato soup

4 oz. cream cheese, softened

1 tsp. sugar

1/4 tsp. dried basil

1/4 tsp. garlic powder

In large saucepan over medium heat, saute onion in butter until tender.  Place tomatoes, milk, soup and cream cheese in blender.  Whir until smooth (or not as long if you prefer chunky tomatoes) add to oniosn in pan.  Stir in remaining ingredients; heat until hot, stirring, being careful not to boil.  Serve immediately.  Makes 4 servings