Description
Homemade roasted garlic tomato soup made by roasting Roma tomatoes, whole garlic head, and onions until caramelized, then blending with broth for rich, comforting soup.
Ingredients
For the Roasted Vegetables:
- 1½ pounds Roma tomatoes (about 8–10 tomatoes) – don’t get the fancy ones, regular grocery store tomatoes work fine
- 1 head of garlic, halved crosswise – yes, the entire head, I’m not kidding
- 1 yellow onion, cut into wedges – just hack it up, doesn’t need to be pretty
- ¼ cup olive oil, divided
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt, divided
For the Soup Base:
- 2 cups broth (vegetable, chicken, or bone broth) – whatever you’ve got lying around
- 1 tablespoon fresh oregano or 1½ teaspoons dried oregano
- ¼ teaspoon smoked paprika – this is what makes people ask for your recipe
- ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes – skip if you’re feeding tiny humans
- ¾ cup half-and-half, optional – but seriously, don’t skip it
- Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
Heat your oven to 450°F. Put one rack up high, one down low. You’ll switch the pans halfway through like you’re some sort of professional.
Toss onion pieces with half the oil and salt on one pan. Stick those garlic halves cut-side down on the same pan. They’ll get all brown and sweet.
On the other pan, coat tomatoes with remaining oil and salt. Make sure they’re all covered or some will be sad and pale.
Pro Tip: Don’t pile everything together like I used to do when I was being lazy. Crowded vegetables steam instead of roast, and you’ll get boring soup instead of magical soup.
Put both pans in the oven for 15 minutes. Then switch their spots and roast another 15 minutes. You want brown edges and soft vegetables, not just warm ones.
Let stuff cool so you don’t burn yourself, then squeeze garlic cloves into your blender. They should squish out like little butter pillows.
Pro Tip: If garlic won’t squeeze out easily, it needs more oven time. Nobody wants raw garlic chunks in their soup – it tastes awful and burns your mouth.
Add tomatoes, onions, and all those brown bits from the pans to the blender with the garlic. Pour in broth, oregano, paprika, and pepper flakes. Blend until it looks like soup instead of chunky vegetable bits.
Dump everything in a pot and heat over medium-low. Don’t blast it on high heat or it’ll taste flat.
Stir in half-and-half if you want creamy soup. Taste it and add salt and pepper until it tastes right to you.
Notes
Never try to blend hot vegetables unless you enjoy cleaning soup off your ceiling. I did this exactly once and spent forever scrubbing tomato chunks out of the light fixture. Let everything cool at least 10 minutes before blending.
Soup too thin? Simmer with the lid off until it thickens. Too thick? Add more broth. Soup doesn’t hold grudges – you can usually fix whatever went wrong.
I make huge batches now and freeze half because it takes the same effort to make a lot or a little. Wednesday dinner becomes a microwave situation instead of a whole kitchen production.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 40 minutes
- Category: Soup
- Method: Roasting
- Cuisine: American
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 cup
- Calories: 145
- Sugar: 8g
- Sodium: 580mg
- Fat: 9g
- Saturated Fat: 3g
- Unsaturated Fat: 6g
- Trans Fat: 0g
- Carbohydrates: 12g
- Fiber: 3g
- Protein: 4
- Cholesterol: 15mg