So, it’s summer. And anyone living in the South knows it’s smokin’ hot around these parts. Time for a perfect chilled soup: Vichyssoise!
Actually, what happened is that I got lost on my way to a bakery on a search for tiramisu (Tiramisu: found! MUST TRY CUPCAKE!) and ended up at my new favorite grocery store. They had leeks on sale for 89 cents! 89 CENTS!!! So, I bought one to try because leeks are one of those produce items that I’ve always passed up but been curious to try. Why was I curious? Well, we have this giant Good Housekeeping Cookbook, and I remember flipping through it one time when I was very small and hitting the recipe for Vichyssoise, being captivated by the ridiculously complicated looking name, and wanting to make it. Only it required leeks. At the time, I don’t think our local grocery store had such fancy produce, and when we finally got a grocery store that had such produce, it was EXPENSIVE. (at least it was to me)
Back to present day, I decided at the store that I was going to make the long-awaited vichyssoise, and made sure to get chicken for the broth (I was out of broth, and the chicken at my new favorite grocery store looked really fresh and was priced such that it would cost me about the same whether I bought a can or made fresh broth) as well as a couple of potatoes for good measure. I also remembered it required cream, but got half and half because it’s less fattening.
When I got home, I searched allrecipes for one that I liked and could make and decided on this one submitted by Derek Parker:
Ingredients
- 2 leeks, chopped
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup thinly sliced potatoes
- 2 1/3 cups chicken stock
- salt to taste
- ground black pepper to taste
- 1 1/8 cups heavy whipping cream
Directions
- Gently sweat the chopped leeks and the chopped onion in butter or margarine until soft, about 8 minutes. Do NOT let them brown.
- Add potatoes and stock to the saucepan. Salt and pepper to taste; do not overdo them! Bring to the boil, and simmer very gently for 30 minutes.
- Puree in a blender or food processor until very smooth. Cool. Gently stir in the cream before serving.
Easy peasy. Now remember, I had bought only one leek, so I halved the above recipe. I also made the chicken broth using half an onion, a carrot, a chicken thigh, salt, and roughly 4 cups of water. (I was out of other green vegetables typically added to a broth). While the broth was cooking, I prepared the leeks with the other half of the onion. I sliced the potatoes super thin (If only I had a mandolin like someone I know . . . ) and added them in once the broth was ready. The potatoes didn’t look quite done at 30 minutes, so I ended up cooking the soup for 45.
Waiting for everything to cool was torture, but the results were worth it! By the next day, I was wishing I had bought another leek because I was sad to be out of soup.
-Elizabeth
**Note: It was so good I tried making this soup again the next week, using Ina Garten’s recipe for Zucchini Vichyssoise and making the broth with the addition of celery. I didn’t like it as much as the recipe I’ve just described and will stick to excluding the celery from the broth because I feel the first vichyssoise had a surprisingly nice sweet finish.