An American Classic, From Scratch

If you are new to FROM SCRATCH WEEKENDS, here is the deal.  My husband and I choose a meal we would like to make from scratch.  Not partially from scratch, but as much from scratch as possible.  This means making our own breads and pastas, as well as using fresh ingredients.  Sometimes you do have to draw the line with how far you take it, but the idea is to get down and dirty in the kitchen and experiment.  It doesn't always have to come out good, but I want to be able to say (even if only made once) "I can make that from scratch!".  We do this on the weekend because we like to invest some time into our meals and things are more relaxed on the weekends.  Plus, it makes good leftovers for during the week.

With being so busy this week and having class all day Saturday and all day Sunday, I was glad Ryan took charge of 'from scratch' weekends and picked out a fantastic meal idea.  As it was Super Bowl Sunday, what better way to celebrate this day than with an American classic.  Yes, I am a vegetarian, so no steak and potato types recipes here, strictly a vegetarian classic!

If you are thinking grilled cheese and tomato soup, you are correct.  We even got creative with the bread.  Here was Ryan's selection:
The tomato soup recipe came from the Joy of Cooking cookbook.  Simple enough:
Starting with the bread.  Look at the herbs in this one.
Look at the dough..ready to go...
Then it was tomato time.  I returned home from class just in time for the peeling part.  Ryan had already roasted therse tomatoes over the gas flame of the stove to loosen the skin.  This was not as easy as you would think.
Lots of tomatoes waiting to be peeled.
Scooping time.  I will say we did not fully get the concept of deseeding, but keeping the juices.  In the end we added some water to the tomatoes to give it some liquid consistency.
PEACE MAN!
Onion time.  I get nervous with the onion because the dog is always waiting for something to fall and onions (as well as garlic) are NO NO's for dogs.
Add it to some olive oil over the heat.
Add the tomatoes.
Yes, time to use the magic stick (my new name for this amazing kitchen tool) for the first time.
Tomatoes before the magic stick was applied...
and after!  I love this thing.
Since the soup was almost ready, it was time to slice up the bread.
I like provolone and Ryan likes the classic way with American cheese.
Gotta use this pan for the rgeat grill lines.
Ah, the finished product.  Here is our lovely meal.
An ooey gooey grilled cheese...
...with classic tomato soup.
As always, we enjoyed our from scratch meal by candlelight.
It was fantastic and a great way to start our evening before the Super Bowl.  For us the game started at 10:30 pm so we did not make it all the way through.  Don't laugh, we totaly DVR'd it and just finished watching before we found out that the Saints won!  It was only really funny because we are watching the show How I Met Your Mother and we are in season 2.  The episode we watched the night before was the one where they can't watch the Super Bowl and have to tivo it and spend the whole next day avoiding finding out who won.  Since we don't get commercials here because we watched it on ESPN America, we liked that today we could just fast forward through the breaks.

Now we are making bagels and watching movies since we are both off from work. 

QUESTION:  Have you ever made tomato soup from scratch?  Did you make anything from scratch this weekend?  Did you go to a Super Bowl party?

12 comments:

Morgan said...

I love your from scratch weekends! You know I'm always up for making things as from scratch as I can! I made sourdough bread this weekend wit my own sourdough starter, but otherwise didn't cook a whole lot, because my weekend was a little strange!

MelissaNibbles said...

Grilled cheese is the best! I imagine it tasted like heaven on homemade bread. Great job!

I've made bread, pasta, and a ton of baked goods from scratch. I come from an Italian family where anything else is just unacceptable :)

Anonymous said...

That homemade bread looks so amazing! Great dinner!
I love How I Met Your Mother! So funny!

Mari said...

Oh My Jesus that has to be the best grilled cheese sammie and soup, that I have ever seen! so impressive.

How I met your mother is one of my fave shows! =) I heart Barney

Melissa said...

This meal has been on my mind all winter. I love it! I can't even imagine how awesome your from scratch version must've tasted!

Shannon, Tropical Eats said...

wow I've never actually thought about making tomato soup from scratch! This looks delish :) That peace sign tomato is too cute

Beth said...

we did make something from scratch this weekend...it's coming soon to the blog.

Didn't make our superbowl party, because we were still snowed in!

Anonymous said...

Perfect comfort food to me! Yes, I recently made tomato soup for the first time - it was www.noblepig.com's bloody mary soup and it was devine!

A quick note though, since I use fresh tomatoes to make my pasta sauce - I just core, quarter and throw the tomatoes in a pot with some olive oil and garlic.

After about an hour on simmer, the skins float to the top and you can use tongs to pull them out - or better yet, since you have a stick blender, just puree the tomatoes and you won't see the skins or the seeds - might save you a step next time? :D

And you know you had me at CHEESE!

Shannon said...

That looks like complete comfort food! Delish! I am so impressed by these meals you both are making. And its so nice that you can enjoy spending that time together :)

Naomi(Onefitfoodie) said...

never made tomato soyup from scratch! but i am not a HUGE tomato soup fan ( i guess thats out of the can though) I bet i would LOVE homemade tomato soup! thte grilled cheese looks AMAZINGGG

Gina; The Candid RD said...

I made more polenta from scratch! I also made new granola :) BUT, you win, this meal looks amazing. I have not yet tried to make tomato soup from scratch but I love the idea. Can you believe I used to hate tomato soup?! I mean come on Gina, get real! Now I love it. I will try to make it with my Magic Bullet :) I like to keep it sort of chunky though, more like tomato basil, which is my favorite form of tomato soup.

HAve a great day Melinda!

Andrea@WellnessNotes said...

I love making soups from scratch, and tomatoe soup is one of my favorite soups ever! And it's PERFECT with grilled cheese sandwiches. Glad you got to use your "magic stick!" I have the same one and LOVE it!!!

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