Roasted Tomato Basil Soup + Gourmet Grilled Cheese Bar = New Christmas Eve Tradition

This year was the first time we hosted Christmas Eve and Christmas Day dinners at our house.  Now that C is old enough to understand the whole Santa Clause thing, it was really important to the hubs and I that we celebrate at our home.  We wanted to experience C coming down the stairs to see his living room filled with presents – you know, the whole Hallmark moment.

All of the grandparents and aunts were very understanding and accommodating of this so I wanted to repay them with some super yummy comfort food.  But what I didn’t want to do was spend both days in the kitchen missing out on all the special family moments.  My solution for Christmas Eve was soup and sandwiches.

I know, it sounds a little too pedestrian for a Christmas Eve meal.  To fancy it up a bit, I did a gourmet grilled cheese bar complete with 5 types of cheese (Havarti, Sharp Cheddar, and 3 specialty cheese from Costco), ham, apple slices, avocado slices, watercress, basil and fresh sourdough bread.  And the star of the show was a Roasted Tomato Basil Soup from The Barefoot Contessa (we skipped the food mill step).  I made the soup ahead of time and stuck it in a crock pot and then put out all the sandwich fixings.  Everyone was very impressed (the apples were a big favorite), it was a very kid-friendly meal, and I wasn’t trapped in the kitchen – perfect!