Tuscany Bread and Cheese Soup

This is meatless. And it's something totally new that I've never made before. And it sounded really good. Alas, not everyone thought so...from the Everything Soup cookbook.

Tuscany Bread and Cheese Soup
1 large sourdough baguette
4 cloves garlic, divided (I used more)
3 tbsp olive oil, divided
Salt (I used sea salt)
1 large spanish onion (I do not know what makes an onion "spanish." They had no onions labeled as such at either Walmart or Hannaford. I saw Autumn at Hannaford whilst looking for a Spanish onion and she didn't know what it was either. I just ended up using a regular onion)
2 stalks celery
2 leeks (the leeks at Hannaford were BIG so I only used one and I still think a whole one might have been pushing too much)
1 28 oz can whole tomatoes, drained & diced (again I ask, why not just buy them diced?)
2 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 pinch of cayenne pepper (a teeny tiny pinch if you are me)
6 cups vegetable broth
2 tbsp basil
1/2 cup parmesan cheese (we used shredded parmesan)

Preheat oven to 300. Cut the bread into 1/2-inch slices. Crush 1 clove of the garlic (I used 2 cloves here) and rub bread slices with it (if you think that sounds hard, you're right), then cut the bread into 1-inch cubes. In a bowl, toss the bread cubes with 1 tbsp of the oil and a generous sprinkling of [sea] salt. Place them in a single layer on a baking sheet and bake for 40 minutes, then set aside.

Meanwhile, coarsely chop remaining garlic (I used 3 cloves here for a total of 5 cloves), onion, celery, and leek.

In a soup pot, heat remaining oil. Add the onion, celery, leek, and garlic. Cook on low for 4 minutes. Stir in the thyme, black pepper, and cayenne pepper. Add the broth, tomatoes, and basil; bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 20 minutes.

Remove from heat and stir in bread cubes. Let sit, covered, for 5 minutes. Sprinkle the parmesan cheese on top.

Okay. Best croutons ever. I am not kidding when I tell you that I ate half of them before the soup was done. I'm not even embarrassed to admit it. They were that good. Also, I did not mix all the (remaining) bread cubes in with the soup in the pot. I added them to the individual bowls, because otherwise the leftover soup would have been unusable. There are enough croutons left for one serving. There should have been more but oh well.

The kids hated this. Steve and I thought it was fabulous. There was nothing the kiddos could really pick out that they liked, like meat or beans, which is what they usually do with soup. Emma wouldn't even touch it and was reduced to tears. Nathan had his with saltine crackers because I knew he wouldn't want the bread crumbs, and occasionally he would dip a corner of one cracker into the broth and eat it. Sam ate about half of his, like a champ, and then said, "No Mom, it's good, I'm just full." But he only says that if he doesn't really like it, because if it's something he likes, he just eats it and doesn't pay attention to if he's full or not. So I guess I will not be making this soup again, but I did already write down the crouton part of it because they were, seriously, SO fabulous. But I will have to be careful because I could eat the whole batch of them without even thinking about it.