A Soup That Roxane Gay Actually Enjoys

I’m Roxane Gay. I’m in my home in Los Angeles. And today, I’m making tomato soup and grilled cheese, because it’s getting cold outside. [MUSIC PLAYING] For the soup, you’ll need butter, onions, all-purpose flour, diced tomatoes, chicken broth, sugar, salt and pepper, half-and-half, and honey. For the grilled cheese sandwiches, you’ll need bread, butter, mayonnaise, Gruyére and Cheddar Jack. So, this is a really easy tomato soup recipe that is actually on The New York Times website. Imagine that. First, you need to cut three or four onions. I use a mix of red and yellow, because I don’t know why, Because I can. I have made this soup once before. It’s a little sweet, which is interesting. You don’t necessarily expect that. I don’t make a lot of changes. It just depends. But I might sometimes put a few extra spices in it just to kick it up a notch. “You gotta to always keep kicking it up a notch, don’t you?” So now we’re going to melt 1/2 a pound of butter. All right, now I’m going to add the onions and cook them until they’re translucent. So, really, like, about 20 minutes. So, when the onions are ready – and you’ll know because it’ll smell great – you add 1/2 cup of flour. And you let that cook for about three minutes or so. Now I’m just adding four cans of diced tomatoes, which is actually a lot. But the good news is that you’ll be able to eat tomato soup for the rest of your life. 3/4 of a cup of half-and-half and 3/4 of a cup of chicken broth, 1/4 cup of sugar, and you also add a tablespoon of salt and a lot of pepper. You have to stir it regularly for half an hour. I’m skipping the celery salt, which you can also add, because I don’t have any. So, fun fact: I hated soup growing up. I especially hated tomato soup. It just felt like gross tomato water. One day, I was bored and decided to make this recipe, and I found that under the right circumstances, I will enjoy a good soup. So, now I’m going to add 2 tablespoons of honey and use my hand blender to puree it into something that resembles something of a soup. Now, I’m going to grate the cheese for grilled cheese. Grated cheese is actually better to use, because it melts faster. I’m using Gruyére and Cheddar Jack. You can use whatever the hell you want. If you want to make your grilled cheese golden and crispy, one way of doing that is a little mayonnaise on one of the outer slices of bread. On the other side of the bread, some butter. Some cheese, like, you know, just feel like, how much cheese is your 47-year-old stomach going to tolerate? Put them in your pan, and let them cook until the cheese is melty. So, it’s about ready, so we’re just going to flip one side on top of the other. Just like five more minutes but keeping an eye on it, because you don’t want the bread to burn. That one’s a little well done, but grilled cheese and tomato soup. Enjoy, and stay warm. [MUSIC PLAYING]