Step 2

Place a medium sized sauce pan over medium heat and add olive oil. When hot, add chopped onion, garlic and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onions begin to turn golden (about 3 minutes).

Step 5

Add in tomatoes (along with all the juices), cashews, Italian seasoning, red pepper flakes, black pepper, remaining salt and sugar. Stir with a spoon, breaking the tomatoes lightly, cover and cook for about 20 minutes.

Step 8

Remove from heat and using an immersion blender, blend all ingredients, until very smooth OR transfer all ingredients into a blender (let cool soup cool for 5 minutes before transferring), blend until very smooth (be careful when blending hot liquid) and transfer mixture back into the pot.

Step 10

(Immersion blender takes a while and might get messy with soup splashing out if the pot isn’t big enough, so we recommend using a normal blender)

Step 13

Stir in chopped basil. Serve with toasted crusty bread for dipping.