Easiest Tomato Soup & Soft Polenta

This meal will seriously take you 20 minutes tops to make and only requires a handful of ingredients. I wish I'd gotten a picture, the polenta looks so purty* spooned onto the red soup. Serve with a protein to round out the meal. Some ideas:

• stir in cashew cream into the soup (1:1 ratio of cashews and water).
• marinated and baked tofu
• marinated and baked tempeh
• add a 15 oz. can of beans (drained and rinsed) or about 1 1/2 cups cooked beans to the soup.
• simmer 3/4 cup red lentils in the soup until they are tender and start to fall apart -- they'll pretty much blend in with the soup while adding great texture (this should take about 30 minutes).
• sprinkle walnut gremolata on top of the soup.

tomato soup:

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, finely diced (optional; I didn't add this and it still tasted great)
1-2 garlic cloves, minced
28 oz. crushed tomatoes (fire-roasted is my favorite)
salt and pepper, to taste
1 1/2 cups stock or water

Saute garlic in olive oil for just until fragrant. Add tomatoes, salt, pepper and stock or water. Simmer for 15-20 minutes, or until polenta is done.

soft polenta: (recipe from here)

3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
2 1/4 cups water
large pinch sea salt
1/2 cup polenta (also called coarse cornmeal)

Bring 2 tablespoons olive oil, water and sea salt to a boil. Reduce heat to low and add polenta. Stir frequently with a rubber spatula (or whisk) for 15-20 minutes, until it reaches a thick porridge-like consistency. Stir in final tablespoon of olive oil. Serve over soup.

Yield: 2 servings

*Purty is an example of metathesis, a linguistic process in which two adjacent sounds are reversed in order. Metathesis of r and a vowel is common, since the phonetic properties of r are so vowel-like. Apparently third and bird used to be thrid and brid. I know I'm a nerd, but this is really interesting to me.