This Simple Salad Dressing Kicks Tomato Soup Up A Few Notches

When the cool days of fall come around, tomato soup takes over the stovetop. There's something comforting about the tangy, sweet flavors in that bubbling pot of pureed tomatoes. It's buttery, nostalgic, and can get even better if you dress it up with a little splash of something extra. Next time you're putting together a batch, add a bit of balsamic vinegar to the soup and those tangy-sweet notes will get even bolder.

Balsamic vinegar is well-known as a salad dressing when combined with a little oil for a basic vinaigrette, but the vinegar by itself has just the right tasting notes for tomato soup. Balsamic vinegar is different from other kinds of vinegar because as it ages the acidity mellows and the sweetness increases. That syrupy-sweet quality compliments the acidic tomatoes while still having enough of a tang to not throw the whole thing off balance.

Many home chefs use traditional or aged balsamic vinegar to give tomato soup a flavor boost — the regular kind you find on grocery store shelves. Most store-bought balsamic vinegar isn't the real deal, as authentic balsamic vinegar comes from the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy and is made from cooked grapes that are aged at least 12 years in wooden barrels, but as long as the grocery store balsamic vinegar you have in your pantry is syrupy and acidic, it'll work.

You only need 1 to 2 teaspoons of balsamic vinegar to kick your tomato soup up a notch, but cooks add the vinegar into their soup at different times. Some recipes add the vinegar just after softening the diced vegetables in oil and butter; others wait until they have a pureed tomato base bubbling on the stovetop before adding the balsamic vinegar along with butter, heavy cream, and seasonings; and still others make the vinegar work double-duty by using it as a deglazer after sauteing the onions for the soup. This last method will pull all the extra flavors off the bottom of the pan and create a flavorful liquid to add to the soup.

Balsamic vinegar also sometimes shows up in the finishing step used to make soup look and taste restaurant-quality: the garnish. You can't just plop a plain bowl of tomato soup on the table and expect an over-the-top reaction. The garnish is where you get to add in a little touch of something creamy, something crunchy, and another dash of that sweet zest that comes from balsamic. Finish the bowl of soup with a dollop of sour cream or a drizzle of heavy cream just before serving, add croutons or blue cheese crumbles for texture, then top it all with a light swirl of balsamic vinegar to tie the flavors together.