Icon from a picrew by grgikau. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
IT’S NOT AT ALL SOUP SEASON, MOTHERFUCKERS, AND YET IT IS ALWAYS SOUP SEASON, MOTHERFUCKERS
My viral soup post hasn’t gotten reblogged in a while and needed to be updated, and @redheadmystic asked me about it today, so here’s a brand-new master post of soups, including most of the ones that were on the list before, as well as some newer favorites. I’ve made many more soups than just this list over the past year, but these selections are my very tip-top, most enthusiastically-recommended picks.
Victoria Granof’s Pasta con Ceci (sometimes I like it thick, more like a pasta dish, and sometimes I add more water and loosen it up because I want it brothier, like a soup)
Smitten Kitchen’s 44-Clove Garlic Soup (don’t be afraid of the number; it’s surprisingly refined and understated)
Yvette Van Boven’s Daube Provençal (stew beef marinated in, then simmered with orange, olives, and a whole bottle of Côtes du Rhône)
BA’s Poached Cod with Tomato & Saffron (note: I double all the ingredients but the fish, and add olives and capers, to make this more like a stew than a poach)
America’s Test Kitchen’s brilliant Creamy Cauliflower Soup (nearly dairy free, but super creamy)
my own recipe for Vichyssoise, adapted from a 1962 recipe in Gourmet
Elaine Louie’s completely brilliant Miso French Onion Soup (vegan if you leave out the melted cheese at the end)
Adding these newly discovered favorites to the list:
Andrea Nguyen’s Vietnamese Canh. Shrimp, onion, ginger, fish sauce, mustard greens: very simple, clean flavors, takes just a few minutes, and absolutely lovely with some glass noodles in it, plus a little sriracha and/or hoisin.
Urvashi Pitre’s Instant Pot Tom Kha Soup. This comes the closest of any soup I’ve ever made to my favorite restaurant version of coconut shrimp soup. Do leave the shrimp tails on, if you can: it gives the broth more flavor and makes it come out absolutely bewitching and addictive. I usually throw in half a block of cubed tofu at the end, as well.
Marcella Hazan’s Broccoli and Potato Soup. Aesthetically, this is a homely soup, but it is so comforting and delicious, especially served with a spoonful of crème fraîche swirled into the bowl at the end. This soup benefits from using homemade rather than boxed or bouillon broth.
Pat Tanumiharja’s Instant Pot Soto Ayam. This Indonesian soup is amazing and richly aromatic and chickeny, but all the garnishes/fixings take it right over the top into the sublime. I always use all of the ones suggested in the recipe.
J. Kenji López-Alt’s 30-Minute Pressure Cooker Pho Ga. This soup changed our life this year. The amount of flavor you can get out of the aromatics and chicken in just a half-hour in the instant pot is nothing short of mind-blowing. I’ve learned to be sure and get a good, deep char on the onion and ginger before proceeding to the other ingredients.
Spicy Kimchi Miso Soup. This vegetarian one helped get us through a long, cold winter. I usually serve this with a scoop of rice.
Instant Pot Kimchi Beef Stew (Kimchi Jigae). This one is similar, but it’s much heartier from the beef. I also learned from firsthand experience that it freezes and reheats very well.
Carla Lalli Music’s Hammy Chickpea Soup. I normally soak the chickpeas overnight (even though the recipe doesn’t call for it) to make sure they cook evenly the next day. This soup is genius: all the carrot, garlic, and onion that cook in the soup with the legumes get fished out and put into a bowl with some of the broth, plus a scoop of the chickpeas, and pureed into a vegetal thickener for the soup. This stuff is out of this world. I forgot to add the red pepper flakes the first time I made this, and now I skip them on purpose because I actually prefer the soup mild.
Pressure Cooker Miso Chicken Ramen with Bok Choy. Makes a great (and easy) base for ramen, and all that’s involved is throwing everything into the instant pot – no searing or sautéing or extra steps – so it’s great for a weeknight.
Hot or Cold Creamy Lettuce Soup. So, this never comes out as pretty color-wise or as smooth as in the photo, but it is so delicious. I love it hot or cold, especially with a few drops of truffle oil on top.
Molly Baz’s Coconut Cod Chowder with Seasoned Oyster Crackers. The warm broth and spices – coconut, ginger, coriander, turmeric, cardamom – transform the leek, potato, and cod. This was a revelation, such an inspired combination of flavors: thick, rich, bright, fragrant, slightly spicy. And those seasoned oyster crackers are genius.
Hi everyone! I haven’t done a soup masterpost in a while, so here’s an updated list of favorites/discoveries from the past year or so.
omg ok put in the tags a food that makes u feel like life is worth living when you eat it. like u eat it and it’s soo good and everything’s fine actually
ppl who say pasta why are u boring. good for u though
good definition, but it technically does still include cereal
what if cereal…. IS soup
CEREAL IS SOUP
this definition technically includes like….pudding and yogurt too, tho, i think
they said “much of the time.” there are also soups that don’t contain any of those things, e.g.:
soups that are broth only
soups that only contain noodles
matzo ball soup
soup contains water. there ain’t no water in fuckn cereal
Milk is approximately 87% water
If I may play devils advocate, cereal could also be considered a salad, with the dry cereal being the main meal, and the milk being a dressing or condiment. Before yall wanna talk about how salads only consist of vegetables, may I remind you of fruit salad, potato salad, pasta salad, bean salad, and the ugly cousin, jello salad.
yeah well my body is 60% water but u don’t see me chillin in a bowl with some carrots u feel
So, hot cereals (oatmeal, cream of wheat, etc) are forms of porridge, ie grains cooked in either a milk or water preparation. Lexically, porridge derives from pottage, which is unquestionably a soup.
Cold cereal is trickier as it has no stage of being cooked in the liquid prior to being served, nor is the liquid cooked beforehand the way most soup broths are (pasteurization is a technically different process from my understanding; I’m also not getting into the hairy subject of the preparation of milk substitutes).
I mean, it’s weird to think of cereal as a soup, but I’m not going to state for sure it isn’t.
Cereal is absolutely a soup. A weird, lazy breakfast soup.
Theoretically, you could argue that the time of day the food is consumed is the key. I don’t think there are any breakfast soups that aren’t cereal or porridge.
Pho is traditionally a breakfast food, I think. And some people drink broth in the morning instead of tea or coffee.
How about the popularity of a bowl of soup being served before actual lunch? Makes zero sense to me. I call soups ‘uppity vegetable tea’ in fits of hungry pique.
I think that’s because liquid is very filling, so it’s good for tiding you over even when it’s not calorically dense.
I love these kinds of debates, they always lead to “if a man is a featherless biped, then a plucked chicken is a man” kinds of moments.
ALT
