Tuscan tomato & bean soup with grilled cheese

There's just something about a snowy winter evening to make you want hot soup and grilled cheese! And since canned tomato soup is just all kinds of horrible for you, I set out to make my own! ~Briana

Ingredients:

4 cloves garlic, diced

3 cups vegetable stock (organic)

28 oz. tomatoes, chopped**

1 Tbsp. tomato paste

1 1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1 tsp dried rosemary

14 oz. can white beans, rinsed and drained (I used cannellini, or great northern beans would work too)

1 tbsp fresh parsley (dried is fine too)

Parmesan cheese to grate on top of soup just prior to serving

For grilled cheese sandwiches:

Bread***

Butter (organic)

Any white cheese (we use white cheddar slices or monterey jack)

**You should never buy canned tomatoes! Chemicals are leached into them when they are packaged this way. Buy only glass jar tomatoes, or in my case, I found an organic brand that is in a cardboard container. If this isn't an option for you, do what Sarah does! She buys organic roma tomatoes and just chops them up herself :)

***I am lucky to live in a rather "crunchy granola" area of the country with a plethora of clean/organic options. So I did not make my bread, but picked up an organic loaf at the store. But if you don't have this as an option, and don't have time to make your own bread, at least use HFCS free bread!

To start, just dump all your ingredients in EXCEPT 1/3 of the beans. Set those beans aside. Bring soup to a boil, then simmer 5 minutes.

Now, remove pot from heat source and blend your soup. You can do this in a blender, or using an immersion (or stick) blender. It looks like this:

Once blended, add in the remaining whole beans. Cover pot, return to low heat and let simmer for 10 minutes.

Now, get your items for the grilled cheese sandwiches and cook those up!

Once the grilled cheese sandwiches are done and your soup is nice and hot, it's time to serve! Grate your parmesan cheese on the soup once it's in the bowl (I definitely forgot to take a photo of this part!), and enjoy!