Summer may be slipping away, but luckily sweet tomatoes are still around in great abundance at the farmer’s market.  I was a little teary when I went to pick up our CSA share at the market this week without the kids.  Every week this past summer they looked forward to market days– they loved seeing what various fruits were available and often I would let them pick out a pastry from one of the bakery stands.  Now that they’re back at school, it seemed strangely quiet without them and I missed their help with hauling back our CSA share to the car.  Last week’s share included over fifteen pounds of gorgeous tomatoes.  We made plenty of salsas and salads, but even then we still ended up with so many tomatoes leftover needing to be used.  The remaining went into a double batch of this creamy tomato basil soup which was enough for our dinner plus more to freeze.  There’s just enough cream in this soup to add a bit of richness without it becoming overly heavy.   Adding pasta makes it a bit more substantial and qualifies it as a main dish while the mozzarella and parmesan turn melty and irresistible on top of the hot soup.  It’s the perfect way to use up all of those end-of-summer tomatoes.

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