Paleo in PDX

The flavor of this soup instantly took me back to childhood. Growing up, I ate a lot of macaroni and tomato soup, made with Campbell’s condensed tomato soup, milk and elbow noodles. If it wasn’t macaroni and tomato, it was plain tomato soup with grilled cheese. It always tasted delicious and was definitely one of my kid comfort foods.

It’s funny, because my sisters and cousins all agreed that our Grandma Reilly’s macaroni and tomato soup tasted the best, but we didn’t know what tasted so special about it, other than the fact that it had really soft, overly-cooked noodles. Well, a few years back at a family get-together (probably Christmas or something), we told grandma that her soup always tasted better than anybody else’s and asked what her secret was. She replied, “I make it just like everybody else — a can of Campbell’s tomato soup, milk, macaroni and a little oleo,” (but it sounded she said a lil oleo).

We all laughed hysterically at the last ingredient and the fact that grandma said it as if we all knew to put oleo in the soup. You’d have to be part of my family to truly understand the humor in this. My grandma always used the word oleo for margarine and butter. I think it’s because one of the first margarine brands back in the day was actually called, Oleo. Does or did anybody else’s grandma call margarine and/or butter oleo?

I decided to make this soup on behalf of my friend Kim over at Healthy Foods to You. She posted a tomato soup and biscuit recipe the other day and the soup sounded so easy, that I decided I wanted to give it a go and add my own twist to it. Honestly, I didn’t change much, other than switching the order of things and adding a couple pats of “oleo” (grass-fed butter in this case) to the soup. I had to for my dear grandma, who passed away earlier this year. Plus, it’s butter … it makes things taste better.

I wanted to add some protein to the meal, but didn’t want to add any meat to the soup to take away from its pure flavor, so decided to make one of my breakfast sandwiches for the side. I whipped up some almond flour biscuits, fried an egg in grass-fed butter and sliced some avocado. Wham, bam breakfast sandwich made!

Ingredients:

• 1 28 oz can organic diced tomatoes
• 1/2 cup full-fat coconut milk
• 2 Tbsp grass-fed butter or ghee
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• Pepper to taste
• Chopped fresh basil for garnish, optional

Directions:

1. Pour the tomatoes into a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the butter, sea salt and pepper, and stir for a few minutes.
2. Once the butter is melted and the tomatoes are heated through, stir in the coconut milk. Once incorporated, pour the entire mixture into the blender and blend on high for a couple minutes or until smooth.
3. Pour the soup back into the pot to stay warm. Serve with chopped basil, if using and a breakfast sandwich. Make sure to dunk your sandwich in the soup too. It’s divine!