Monterey Jack Cheese Soup

Hello! We had this on Wednesday for supper before church. Also, that day I made homemade yeast bread for the first time, with only 2 calls to my mom, so that was pretty cool. It was whole wheat and rather dense, so I won't bother with posting that recipe, but I am going to try my hand at white bread next (Cinnamon Swirl--stay tuned). Anyway we had this soup with the bread. I think I was expecting something heartier, but it ended up being the texture of tomato soup (the Campbell's version). Except white. So it was weird. I almost dumped the whole thing down the sink because it didn't look at all appetizing. But you know Duke Frugal would never allow that. He said let's just try it, and if it's not good we can just have homemade bread for supper (they used to do that in pioneer days all the time. I know because I read the books). So we tried it, and it was actually quite yummy! We dipped our dense wheat bread into it, and then when that was gone tried it with saltines, just like we do for tomato soup, and it was very good. So here it is...

Monterey Jack Cheese Soup
1 cup chicken broth
1 lg tomato, peeled, seeded, and diced (boy is it hard to peel a tomato)
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
2 tbsp chopped green chilies (I left these out because I thought they would make it too spicy)
1 garlic clove, minced
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
salt & pepper to taste
3 cups milk, divided
1 1/2 cups (6 oz) shredded Monterey Jack cheese

In a 3 qt sauce pan, combine broth, tomato, onion, chilies, and garlic. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 10 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Remove from heat and set aside. In another saucepan, melt butter. Stir in the flour, salt and pepper until smooth. Gradually stir in 1 1/2 cups milk. Bring to a boil; cook & stir for 1 minute or until thickened. Slowly stir into vegetable mixture. Reduce heat; add cheese and remaining milk (even though it doesn't say this, I think you return the original pan to the burner. Because how can you reduce the heat of something that is removed from heat?). Cook and stir over low heat until cheese is melted. Serve immediately. 5 servings.

This is from the Taste of Home cookbook that mom got me & Jess for Christmas, and she has one too. For interested parties, this was on page 66. I totally didn't follow my own seestem, because usually I work straight through a cookbook until I'm done and don't go to another one, unless it's a cooking magazine which I try to incorporate when I get the magazine. But I knew I was making that bread this week and wanted something soupy to go with it. So when I was glancing through this one I saw this recipe and it sounded good & easy. But no wonder they don't have a picture of it with the recipe. I bet nobody would make it then.