Grilled cheese on a new level

What's better comfort food than grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup? I know I can do better than any restaurant in town.

I had some Campbell's tomato soup Healthy request, the low sodium version to start as my soup base. Gotta watch that sodium. I added the soup to a saucepan, and brainstormed how to make it special. I opened a can of diced low-sodium tomatoes, and spooned in some of the diced tomatoes into the now-empty soup can, until it was about half of the diced tomatoes and liquid. Before dumping it into the pan, however, I filled the can to the brim with *gasp* whole cream.

If you've never made soup with whole cream, you're missing out. It adds an entirely new dimension of creaminess. And, with only about half a soup can of it going in along with some tomato chunks, it's not really all that much. Plus, I never keep milk in the house because it sours before I can use it or consume it. Cream stays "good" for much longer and comes in a smaller container I use up quickly.

If you really would rather not use cream, go ahead and use half and half or whole milk - please, no skim. Yuck. There. I said it.

Moving along to the spices now. To the soup I added about 1 tsp. of garlic powder (not garlic salt, please), 2 generous shakes of chili powder, 1/2-3/4 tsp. ground white pepper, and a generous tablespoon of Italian herbs (a blend of thyme and parsley). I rarely ever measure so realistically, I'm only guessing here. It's important not to add too many strange spices to tomato soup, the purpose is only to dress it up, not cover it up.

So, while that's simmering, I preheated a large fry pan (empty) on the stove at a temperature just a tiny bit below medium heat.

Now, on to prepare the grilled cheese sandwiches. We picked up some amazing Trader Joe's Multigrain sliced bread on Saturday, and I just had to try it for the sandwiches. The outside crust is literally covered in white and dark sesame seeds. Yum. There's about a gram of fiber in each slice, which isn't great but hey if you're eating bread it's never going to be for the fiber it gives you.

Here's another of my must-do's. I always use unsalted butter. This way, I never get salt when I don't want it and if I do want salt - that's what a salt shaker is for. Ha.

So, I lightly buttered one side of my grilled cheese, taking care to butter up to the edges. You will want them crispy. Then LIGHTLY sprinkled the butter with garlic salt. Yes, now I'm adding the salt. It belongs here. I flip the butter side down, then lay some thin pieces of aged white cheddar cheese. (With this pungent of a cheese, you only need a very thin layer.) I had on hand some fresh Thai basil, so I chiffonaded some and put a bit on the cheese. If you don't have fresh, substitute some dried green herbs such as parsley, thyme or even basil.

I made a second sandwich bottom this way as well.

You might need to stir the soup now.

Now that my pan was heated up I sprayed some non-stick spray OR some olive oil from my non-aerosol pump into it. Plop down the cheese sandwich halves, butter side down.

It's probably a good idea to dish up the soup at this point, so it can cool slightly before being consumed. One can produced two nice sized bowls of soup for us.

While those are cooking, prepare the top halves of the bread with butter and garlic salt, then plop them onto the side that's in the pan already.

Only you will know when they are ready to be flipped. Let them get dark golden brown - you want it to be crunchy and golden. Then lay your second half of each sandwich on top of the cheesy half, butter side up, and flip it with a spatula. Repeat.

When the other side is just as golden and brown, remove them from the pan, cut in half and serve with the soup.

Yum. After all this, who wouldn't love grilled cheese with tomato soup?