homemade tomato basil soup

I never ate tomato soup much growing up, but now I LOVE to order it at Bob Evans and Rockne's restaurants (of course both of which are not in Tennessee).  Applebee's tomato soup is pretty good too.  It is a spicier tomato basil soup, great for a meal.  Now I also eat Campbell's tomato soup, made with milk, and like it especially with grilled cheese.  But I thought I would try my hand at homemade tomato basil soup using a recipe I found online.

I don't have an immersion blender (lucky for Sarah I didn't take it at the kitchen swap), so I had to use my blender, but that's okay, it worked great!

So here are my comments about this recipe: it wasn't too difficult to make, but it was time consuming.  Of course for those who like to cook or spend time in the kitchen on the weekends, it wasn't bad.  I thought it was okay, and Andy thought it was okay.  I will say that the next day when I heated up the leftovers, it was MUCH better.  So if I made this again, I would purposely make it the day before, because it was that much better the second day.

That being said, I don't think I will make this recipe again.  It just wasn't worth the time and cost of the ingredients when for a simple dinner of tomato soup and grilled cheese, I will go with Campbell's soup.  But I would recommend this recipe to others, provided you make it the day before!