I didn’t know that about Blount and Panera – and I can affirm that the Blount-branded tomato soup is way better than the Panera, even though Panera’s is pretty good, too.
I could be wrong. I’m doing all this from memory.
I’d note that there’s a clear difference between Blount’s Clam Shack clam chowder and Panera’s – and in that case, Panera’s is much better.
The tomato-shaped objects that you see in the grocery store, sure, those have no flavor. Those are bred to look nice, and to ship well without bruising, and to have a long shelf life, and flavor is the tradeoff for getting those things. But the thing is, none of those traits matter for making tomato soup. Nobody’s seeing the tomatoes before they’re pureed and mixed with the other ingredients, and you can put the cannery right next to the fields and can them immediately after picking, so travel and shelf life aren’t an issue. And the flavorful tomato varieties do still exist. So why not use them, for soup?
And yes, @CairoCarol , grape tomatoes still aren’t near as good as real tomatoes from the garden, but they’re a heck of a lot better than most of the tomato-shaped objects in the grocery store. Off season, they’re about the best you can do.
A few years ago, the Dollar Tree had cans of lobster bisque on the shelf. I couldn’t resist buying and trying, of course. Wasn’t expecting much, but it actually wasn’t that bad. I don’t know how much actual ‘lobster’, if any was in it, but I suppose it could be a base if I wanted to add something. 
Campbells still sells canned Cream of Shrimp soup, it’s hard to find, but it, too, is a serviceable medium for fixing up. A dash of sherry, cayenne, cream, and seafood of some sort . 
I add a can of minced clams to a can of New England clam chowder for extra clammy goodness. 
Production measured as weight per acre.
That doesn’t, I don’t think, work as a straight contradiction to flavor (though I’m not sure); but if the breeding aim is concentrated on quantity produced without equal attention to flavor, that’s what you’ll get.
Progresso makes some decent soups like their chicken sausage gumbo. I’d never buy a soup labeled as “light” anything.
Another canned soup failure - stuff marketed as “spicy”, like clam chowder. Good herbs, fine. Heat and nothing else, no thanks.
Yes, sorry, sloppy wording on my part. Not trying to blame GMO tech – I don’t know if it was involved — I just meant that tomatoes were bred for those commercially useful qualities, and flavour was lost in the process.
You actually think mass-market American food will have any heat whatsoever in it? I think the typical recipe for those is one ghost pepper seed per 500-gallon batch.
There actually was moderate heat in the one canned “spicy” clam chowder I tried. I’m fine with a certain amount of heat, except that a spice-less soup with added capsaicin doesn’t make it for me.
I recently tried Progessso “Spicy” Clam Chowder but the weird artificial “spicy” taste me me down it all out after the first bite. They went overboard with spicy and you couldn’t even taste the actual soup base underneath.
Agreed. If they are selling a “light” version it is likely they replaced the original ingredients with some unholy melange of thickeners, emulsifiers, and the like, even more so than in the original version.
I accidentally purchased Ro-Tel tomatoes with habaneros (and IIRC started a thread about it here). It didn’t have many habaneros in it, but if one found its way into my mouth, I could taste AND FEEL it. That was way too hot for my palate, so I’m more careful about reading labels now. I did finish the dish I made with it, but won’t be a repeat customer.
I have made potato soup from a recipe, but I wasn’t up to it at the time. IDK if I have any more cans of this slop in my pantry, but if I do, I’m not sure I’ll even donate them to the food pantry. (OTOH, maybe some needy person out there LIKES this soup?)
Canned tomatoes are the way to go if you want flavor, because they’re not bred for looks. @CairoCarol, don’t you live in Hawaii? You could grow and/or purchase fresh off the vine tomatoes every day of the year.
Have you seen the “zero calorie” salad dressings and dessert toppings? They really aren’t truly zero calories, maybe 10 per tablespoon, but the RDA service size is officially zero calories. How healthy are things like that, anyway?
I did look at some of the ingredient lists, and the closest thing I saw to anything natural was carrageenan, which is a controversial thickener made from seaweed.
Any food for which fat is a major component, a nonfat version of it is always going to be an abomination. For something like salad dressing, you might be able to get away with low fat, but even that’s iffy. If it really matters to you, just use the real stuff but use less of it.
Ever had low-carb spaghetti? That’s pretty nasty too.
Yes, and I usually do. But my tomato plants didn’t really make it through a drought we had recently, so it will be a while before I have more garden tomatoes (which can be harder than you think to grow - year-round warmth means more pests and diseases, and the heat can keep the fruit from setting. But I’ve found a good variety that works on my property).
And farmers’ markets aren’t available 24/7, but the grocery store (almost) is!
Not to mention the fact that you need some fat for the fat soluble vitamins is so many vegetables.
Okay, that makes sense. I do know that peppers can be grown year-round in warmer climates, and in fact are perennials in many areas.
Oh yeah - sweet peppers are a little touchy, because they are more prone to disease. But chilis (which have developed defenses against insect attacks) are amazing, and perennial. I have way more chili peppers than I can use or give away. I’m just about to throw out a bag of ghost peppers that I promised myself I would pickle, but haven’t gotten around to, mostly because I ALREADY have a large jar of pickled ghost peppers. (Meanwhile I dug up the ghost pepper plant - it was ridiculously prolific but I simply couldn’t use its fruit.)
I have one Hawaiian chili plant (basically a birdseye chili) that just won’t quit. As much as I like hot food, it’s impossible to keep up. Luckily, it is also an ornamental, so it will not suffer the ghost pepper fate.