Tomato and Basil Soup with Panini Soldiers and it's my birthday!

Yes all the rumors I've been circulating on social media are true; it is indeed my birthday!  (Please hold your applause, it's a yearly thing.)  Honestly I don't find the day all that exciting.  Usually I just give myself a high five because I did wake up after all.  

Last week when I ordered a glass of wine at a restaurant the server asked if I was 21, after I quit laughing at her I informed the nice young lady I was going to be 45 in a week.  "Oh," she replied. "My mom died at 44."  I immediately offered her my condolences and when she came back with my glass she added, "Make sure and take good care of yourself."  I wasn't quite sure if she was trying to tell me I was looking as tired and run down as I felt or if she was psychic and knew something I didn't.  

Usually I look forward to making myself an over the top dessert involving multiple layers and flavors but Mr. Bubonic was hanging out on the couch today ill and feverish and I figured it was much safer to hide upstairs in my office and catch up on some work.  

Fine I will eat healthy even if it kills me I kept uttering to myself.  The heirloom tomatoes I've been buying are so dripping fantastic right now I decided if I have to preserve my life longer I was going to do it with a bowl of Tomato Basil Soup.

Don't ask me how this sounded good, considering I have went to bed with the smell of tomatoes oozing from my pores the last few nights while I rebuild my inventory for the year.

Heirloom Tomato Basil Soup

4 pounds assorted heirloom tomatoes or any very ripe tomatoes you can find

2 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 cup carrots, finely shredded (about 2 medium sized)

1 small red onion, finely diced

1/2 red bell pepper, seeded, and finely diced

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1/4 cup fresh chopped basil leaves

Heat oven to 425 degrees F.  

Cut tomatoes in half and remove cores, place the halves cut side down on a baking sheet lined with parchment and place in the oven for 10 minutes.  Let cool 10 minutes.

Peel the skins off the tomatoes and squeeze the seeds out into a sieve over a bowl.  Reserve all the tomato juice and pulp.

In a stockpot add the olive oil, carrots, onion, and bell pepper and cook on medium-low heat till veggies are starting to wilt and become translucent.  Add the tomatoes and juice, salt and pepper, and simmer on medium heat for 15 minutes.  Add the basil and cook 5 more minutes.  

Use an immersion blender and pulse until semi-smooth.  If you want a chunkier soup you can skip this step.

Mozzarella and Pesto Soldiers

Sliced sourdough bread

Fresh Mozzarella balls

Basil pesto

Slather a little pesto on a piece of sourdough, a couple nice slabs of mozzarella, top with another slice of sourdough, place into a Panini maker or pan, drizzle the top with olive oil.  Wait for the crustification and oozification to take place and slice into soldiers.

I bought the bread, pesto, and cheese; after all I probably don't have much time to waste after my ominous warning.  But if you have plenty of more years ahead of you here are a couple of recipes you may want to try.

Homemade Mozzarella Cheese

Sourdough Bread

As for the source of the Black Death outbreak, well I traced it back to an unlikely source.  After much research and tapping my vast medical knowledge I had no choice but to conclude that Rusty is the pariah.  I have no idea how I could have missed it, it was right there staring at me the whole time: Blackening nails and an inguinal bubo on his armpit region. 

If I make it to 45 years and 1 day all bets are off and I'm going back to decadent baked goods.

In the words of my wise daughter, "YOLO!"

The Birthday Girl

20 lbs. of San Marzano Tomatoes Preserved - Check!

I have been waiting for the San Marzano tomatoes all summer. At the farm stand where I frequent they grown an heirloom variety of the Roma called the San Marzano, this variety is the tops for sauce. I love them, they have a thinner skin, less seeds and are a little less acidic. I loaded up my car with a flat and headed for home.

I see why the call if Labor Day, there was not much rest going on around here this weekend. I thought I would lounge around and recover from my cold, but my daughter came home from college with friends and my husband invited friends over for a BBQ. Plus I already had the tomatoes waiting for me to preserve. It was a long, but worth the effort weekend.

Here are the beautiful tomatoes I found.

For preserving the tomatoes you just need a few things:
A large stockpot full of boiling water
A large bowl full of ice water
Lemon juice or distilled white vinegar
Kosher or pickling salt (not iodized)
A large pot for canning the jars

Sterilize all your jars and lids with boiling water and set aside. 

To Remove the Skins:

Put a large pot of water on to boil and cut X's in the bottom of each tomato. Place about 20 tomatoes at a time into the boiling water for two minutes or so, remove and place the tomatoes into a bowl filled with ice water. Peel.

Or you can cut the tomatoes in half and lay them single layer on a baking sheet that is lined with parchment or a silpat mat and bake in a 425 degree F oven for 10 minutes.

Add 2 tablespoons lemon juice (or vinegar either works fine) and 1 teaspoon salt to a clean Mason jar. Add about 20 tomatoes per jar or until 1/2" from the top of the jar. Make sure and pack down and all the air bubbles are out, you can stick a chopstick in there to get any air bubbles out. Wipe the top of the jar with a clean cloth and place lid on and band.

***I thought I would clarify that the 1/2" of head space applies to the tomato sauce too, if you are canning it.***

Fill the rest of the jars, I ended up with 7 full 1 quart jars.

You will need a large pot like this one for the canning process, mine is a tamale pot I use at Christmas. They are really inexpensive at a Mexican grocery store and already have a rack on the bottom, which is necessary for suspending the jars.

You can use any pot if it is tall enough to cover the jars with boiling water by about 2 inches. I like to fill the pot about 2/3 of the way with water and bring it to a boil so it's ready when I am. 

Add the jars to the boiling water and leave in for 45 minutes. Remove jars from the hot water with a jar lifter and place on the counter on a towel to cool. You will hear them pop and that's good, it means they are sealed. If you don't hear the pop, press down on the center it shouldn't give and that also means they are sealed.

If your jars don't seal, you can trying placing them back in the hot water for a bit and try again. Sometimes on rare occasion I've gotten a bad lid that didn't seal, but most times they work.

Happy Canning,

Gina