Cream of Tomato Soup

This soup is so easy and so impressive because it's beautiful in color, texture and it tastes delicious! You will want to make grilled cheese sandwiches to accompany it!! I tested it out on our friends along with their 3 year old son and our 1 year old son. They both loved it, so suffice it to say, this is a soup for all ages!

Ingredients:

2- 28 oz. cans of stewed or whole tomatoes OR 8-10 med. to large fresh tomatoes blanched and seeded
2 Tbsp. tomato paste
2-3 cups of vegetable stock
4 Tbsp. olive oil
2 Tbsp. butter
2 carrots roughly chopped
1 shallot
2 garlic cloves
1 bay leaf
4 Tbsp. flour or cornstarch
2 Tbsp. brown sugar OR honey
1/4 cup cream
salt & pepper to taste

In a large soup pot on medium heat add the olive oil and saute the grated carrots, shallot, garlic, salt & pepper until tender, about 5 minutes. Add the butter until melted, then add the flour and stir until blended. To that add the tomato paste and brown sugar and stir all of this together to create a rough thick paste for the rest of our ingredients. Add the tomatoes and stir until well blended. Add 2 cups of the vegetable stock to start. If it seems too thick at this point, add the additional cup of stock. Throw in the bay leaf and turn to low heat cooking slowly for an hour and stirring occasionally. Take off the heat and let sit in the pot for an hour. Take out the bay leaf and blend the soup in a blender and return back to the soup pot and reheat. A few minutes before serving, stir in the cream, more salt & pepper to taste if needed and heat for an additional minute. This soup will easily feed 8 people. Enjoy!