AI-generated illustration of roasted baby tomato soup in two bowls, with fine basil flecks and wholemeal bread alongside

Lunch

Roasted Baby Tomato Soup

Published 01 November 2026 · Updated 01 November 2026

Roasting baby tomatoes with thinly sliced onion gives this soup a rounded sweetness and a little toasted depth. The roasting juices go into the pan with a modest amount of stock, then basil is blended through for a fresh finish.

Not kitchen tested by The Black Farmer.
Serves 2
Prep 38 min
Cook 58 min
Total 96 min

Timing: 96 minutes nominal elapsed: max(20 preheat, 15 preparation) + 2 oven loading + 40 roasting + 5 off-heat tray handling/deglazing/transfer + 5 bringing to simmer + 8 simmering + 5 pre-blending pause + 4 blending + 5 final heating + 2 serving. Cooking is 58 minutes; elapsed preparation stages are 28 minutes plus 10 minutes of cooling/handling pauses, reported together as prep_minutes 38. cooling_minutes is explanatory and already included in prep_minutes, not an additional 10 minutes. No marination or rest. Turning, stirring, safe handling and the optional 30-second temperature hold are within their named stages. The blender stage is a 4-minute allowance, not 4 minutes of continuous motor use. All durations are untested estimates; extra oven, tenderness, appliance-limit cooling or heating time must be added if required. Bread and other accompaniments are separate and excluded.

Ingredients

  • Baby Tomatoes on the Vine - 250g

    Baby tomatoes

    750g as sold (3 × 250g packs)

    Remove and discard every vine, stalk and calyx. Rinse and dry all fruit, then halve through the stalk end; quarter any tomatoes larger than about 3cm. Use all fruit and retain all roasting juices. The 750g is the pack weight before removing the vines, not the prepared fruit weight.

    £4.70

Adds 3 items across 1 products — £14.10 total.

Pantry ingredients such as oil, salt and herbs are not included.

Other Ingredients You'll Need

  • Onion — 100g prepared weight (Peel, halve from root to tip, remove the root and slice across into 5mm half-moons.)
  • Garlic — 2 medium cloves, about 10g as sold (Leave skins on for roasting; trim any loose papery outer flakes. Squeeze out all tender flesh after roasting and discard skins.)
  • Vegetable stock — 300ml, divided: 100ml for the tin and 200ml for the saucepan (Prepared, room-temperature, reduced-salt stock. Check its ingredients and allergens, particularly celery; not a guaranteed allergen-free dish. No extra water or stock is required in the planned formulation.)
  • Olive oil — 20ml (All used to coat the tomatoes, onion and garlic before roasting; no separate finishing drizzle.)
  • Basil — 5g leaves (Rinse and dry, discard coarse stalks and tear leaves; all blended into the soup, none reserved as garnish.)
  • Fine salt — 1g (All on the vegetables before roasting. Use reduced-salt stock; no further salt is prescribed.)
  • Ground black pepper — 0.25g (All added to the saucepan before simmering.)

Method

Heat the oven and prepare the vegetables

Set the oven to 200°C conventional / 180°C fan / gas 6, with a shelf in the middle; allow 20 minutes to preheat. During the first 15 minutes, assemble the equipment, measure the ingredients and prepare the vegetables. Remove every vine, stalk and calyx from the tomatoes, rinse and dry all the fruit, then halve through the stalk end, quartering any larger than about 3cm. Slice the peeled onion into 5mm half-moons. Leave the two garlic cloves in their skins. Rinse, dry and tear the basil leaves and set aside. Put the tomatoes, onion and garlic in the shallow metal tin with all 20ml oil and 1g salt. Toss thoroughly, spread into a single loose layer and tuck the onion beneath and between the tomatoes rather than leaving a pile of exposed onion. Let the oven finish heating; this preparation overlaps preheating and is not an extra 15 minutes. If the oven has not reached temperature, wait and add the actual extra time.

Load the tin and roast

Allow 2 minutes to settle the vegetables into their layer and transfer the tin to the oven. Roast for about 40 minutes at the same temperature. Turn the onion and tomatoes gently halfway through, keeping the onion among the juicy fruit; this handling and the final texture checks are included in the 40 minutes. The tomatoes should be collapsed with a few browned edges and plenty of juice, the onion completely tender, and the garlic soft when pressed carefully with a spoon. Do not aim for dry or blackened vegetables. If the onion or garlic remains firm, continue roasting and add the actual extra time; the soup cannot blend away undercooked onion flavour.

Recover the garlic and roasting juices

Allow 5 minutes for this off-heat handling stage. With oven gloves, put the tin on a stable heatproof surface and let the fiercest sizzling subside. Lift out the garlic with a spoon and, when safe to handle, squeeze all the soft flesh into the deep saucepan; discard the skins. Spoon the tomatoes, onion and their juices into the saucepan. Slowly pour the reserved 100ml room-temperature stock into the metal tin, keeping your face away from any steam, and scrape up the brown sticky juices with a wooden spoon. Pour this into the pan too. Do not put the roasting tin on a hob, and leave genuinely black burnt patches behind. Add the remaining 200ml stock and all the black pepper. If the garlic is still too hot to handle safely, wait longer and include that extra time.

Bring to a simmer

Set the saucepan over medium heat and allow about 5 minutes to reach a gentle simmer, stirring and breaking up the softened tomatoes with the spoon. Look for small bubbles across the surface, not just at one edge. Add actual extra time if needed to reach this point.

Let the flavours settle together

Reduce to low heat, cover with the lid slightly ajar and simmer gently for 8 minutes, stirring once during this stage to prevent catching. The onion should yield easily against the side of the pan and the liquid should taste of roasted tomato, not just stock. Keep the heat low enough that the soup does not spit or boil down rapidly.

Pause before blending

Turn off the heat, move the pan to a stable heatproof surface and uncover. Wait 5 minutes for bubbling to stop, then add all the basil. This pause does not make the soup cool or safe to touch. Use only an immersion blender rated for hot soup; check its maximum temperature and wait longer if its instructions require. Never transfer this hot mixture to a sealed jug blender.

Blend in the saucepan

Allow 4 minutes for positioning, blending in short pulses and scraping down safely. Keep the pan steady and the blender head fully submerged before switching on at low speed. Keep the blade guard clear of the pan base, tilt the shaft only slightly and do not lift the spinning head above the soup. Stop and unplug before clearing anything from the guard or scraping the sides. Blend until the onion and skins are finely dispersed and the soup looks even; a domestic stick blender can leave tiny flecks of skin, so this is not a promise of a perfectly sieved texture. Switch off and let the blade stop before lifting it out. There is no straining stage and no tomato flesh is deliberately discarded.

Heat through and serve

Return the pan to medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently, until steaming hot throughout with gentle bubbles. If checking with a clean thermometer, stir first and check the centre reaches at least 75°C for 30 seconds; the check and hold are included in these 5 minutes. Add actual extra heating time if needed and avoid a fierce boil. Allow 2 minutes to ladle the whole batch equally into two bowls and serve. Eat with bread prepared separately; this is two generous lunch or light-supper portions, not four large meals.

Serving Suggestion

Serve with thick slices of wholemeal bread or a Cheddar toastie prepared separately. For a crisp accompaniment, try Parmesan Crisps. Bread, cheese and crisps are optional accompaniments, not ingredients in the soup or part of its basket, yield or timetable; they add their own allergens.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do I weigh 750g after taking off the vines?

No: 750g is the as-sold amount from three 250g packs. Remove every vine, stalk and calyx and use all the fruit. The prepared fruit will weigh less; there is no need to top it up to 750g.

Why only 300ml stock?

The roasted tomatoes bring their own juice, and retaining it gives the soup its body. The 100ml used to loosen the tin is part of the 300ml total, not an extra addition. A much larger stock quantity would dilute the tomato flavour.

Do the skins need removing?

No. Roast the halved fruit with skins on and blend it in the saucepan. A hot-soup-rated immersion blender disperses the skins, though fine flecks may remain. This recipe is not strained and does not promise a completely skin-free finish.

Can the immersion blender go into bubbling soup?

Take the pan off the heat and use the stated pause, then follow the blender manufacturer's hot-liquid and temperature limits. Keep the head submerged, start low and stop before lifting it out. The pause does not make hot soup safe to touch; a sealed jug blender is not a direct substitute.

Why roast the onion under the tomatoes?

Thin onion slices soften in the tomato juices while their edges take on some colour. Exposed onion can blacken before the tomatoes finish. Turn during roasting and check it is fully tender before transferring; extra blending is not a cure for firm onion.

Why leave the garlic skins on during roasting?

The skins protect the small cloves from drying out while the tomatoes soften. Check that the cloves are soft, then let them become safe to handle before squeezing all the tender flesh into the saucepan. Discard the skins; they do not go into the soup.