2 tablespoons olive oil

1 onion, diced

2 carrots, diced

2 stalks celery, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

28 oz. canned tomatoes, diced

3 cups fat-free chicken stock

4 slices white bread

12 whole peppercorns

½ cup heavy whipping cream

Salt and black pepper to taste

3 oz. gruyere cheese, cut into 4 slices

Heat the oil in a large pot over medium high heat. Add the diced onion, carrots and celery. Cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, 4 to 6 minutes. Add the garlic and cook 1 minute. Stir in the tomatoes and chicken stock. Increase the heat to high and bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low and simmer until the vegetables are tender, 14 to 16 minutes. Stir occasionally. Meanwhile, using a cookie cutter cut the bread slices into ghost shapes. Cut the cheese slices into the same shape. Toast the ghosts in a toaster oven. Place them on an oven-safe tray, and then place the cheese on top.

Use 3 peppercorns to make eyes and a mouth for each ghost. Put them back into the toaster oven and toast again to melt the cheese. (If you don’t have a toaster oven, you can broil the cheese toasts about 4 inches beneath the broiler element until the cheese is bubbly, 1 to 2 minutes.) Puree the soup in a blender in two batches. Return it to the pot. Stir in the cream and season with salt and pepper. Heat through, and then serve in soup bowls with the ghost toasts on top.