I often feel like a tiny speck of nothingness on this planet, but I never feel physically smaller than when I’m at Costco, heaving a cart that’s twice the width of a coffin through the warehouse. On the last trip, I decided that what I needed to buy — other than a bag of six avocados, 50 pounds of sidewalk salt, and two pounds of garlic — was a 106-ounce can of Nina whole tomatoes for $6.

“I’ll make so much tomato soup,” I told myself. The can was cute — I liked the look of Nina, basking in the Italian sun, while her (multiple) lovers wondered where the hell she was — and figured that after I made a vat of tomato soup, I could turn the can into a planter, or a bathroom trash can, or something. There is no confidence like that of the casual DIYer.

As for the tomato soup, I wanted something classic. The ideal is soup that’s reminiscent of Campbell’s, but better. Smooth, creamy, rich in tomato flavor.

My favorite recipe is from Abra Beren’s phenomenal vegetable-loving cookbook Ruffage, where it’s a riff on a recipe for garlic confit (page 218). You’d almost flip the page and miss it if you weren’t paying attention. But the simple recipe makes an unforgettable soup. Part of that is the presence of red pepper flakes, whose heat brings the tomato to life, while also being tempered by a good dose of cream. (I think cream is necessary with tomato soup to cut through the acidity. If you’re dairy-free, add a big potato or two! Seriously, it makes puréed soups so creamy.) But the garlic confit is the real secret. It brings a deep, roasted flavor and a sweet garlickyness you can’t deny.

After making the tomato soup, I spent a week enjoying it in different ways — paired with grilled cheese for dinner, with a side of Cheez-Its for lunch. I added avocado one day, chile crisp the next. When I discovered wilted spinach in the fridge, I chopped that up and added it to the soup. If you’d like to up the protein, you could add a plop of cottage cheese or a spoonful of white beans. If you’re a dreamer, you could consider buttered popcorn as a crouton?

I tweaked Abra’s recipe, adding tomato paste to oomph the tomato flavor and scaling up for 106 absurd ounces of tomatoes. (That’s more than seven of the usual 14.5-ounce cans.) There are only two of us at home — my husband and me — but after a Sunday of soup-making, I now have a freezer stash of soup, waiting for a wintry Michigan evening. Of which I’ll have plenty.

In case that’s way too much soup for you, I included a mini ingredient list below the big one. Same method.

Large Format Tomato Soup

4 oz butter (1 stick)
2 ½ tsp red chile flakes
10 sprigs thyme
2 6-oz. cans tomato paste
1 106-oz. can whole tomatoes
5 cups water
5 heads (130 grams-ish) confit garlic
2 tablespoons salt, plus more to taste
2 cups heavy cream, plus more as needed for happiness

Make the garlic confit. Preheat the oven to 250°. Keep the peels on but cut a smidge off the top of the 5 heads of garlic (so they’ll be easier to pop out later) and arrange them in a small baking dish. Sprinkle with salt and submerge in neutral oil (I use avocado—you know where I bought it). Cover the dish with a lid or foil and roast for 1-2 hours. They should be golden brown and soft when ready. When it’s cooled down enough to be handled, squeeze the garlic goo out of its slippery jackets into a bowl for soup prep. Save the oil—two weeks is the safe zone—for garlic bread or salad dressing.

Soup time. In a large stock pot—and I mean large—melt the butter. When it’s foaming, add the chile flakes and thyme, stirring around for 1 minute. Then add the tomato paste and stir occasionally, until it’s brick red and beginning to caramelize, 5-8 minutes. Add the tomatoes (I ladled them in to avoid crime scene splatter), water, garlic, and salt. Bring it to a boil and then let it simmer, stirring here and there, for 20 minutes or so. Remove the soup pot from the heat and go do something while it cools—I suggest a nice long bath and a nap. Then blend the soup in batches (yes, take out the sprigs of thyme), returning the smooth, blended soup to the pot to meld it all together happily. Taste and add salt if needed. Either add the cream now and serve, or store the soup in the fridge/freezer and add the cream per individual bowl.

Normal Format Tomato Soup
2 oz. (55g) butter
1 tsp red chile flakes
5 sprigs thyme
1 6-oz. can tomato paste
3 14.5-oz. cans whole tomatoes
2 cups water
10 confit garlic cloves (55g)
1 cup heavy cream

Adapted from Garlicky Tomato Soup in Ruffage: A Practical Guide to Vegetables, by Abra Berens.

P.S. The veggie-forward lasagna we can’t stop making and the OG tomato sandwich.