Skip to content
Join our Newsletter

Food and Drink

Dodge the dog days of summer with a cold souper supper
glendabyline

Celebrity chef/bad boy Tony Bourdain pegs the start of his career on one sublime moment: eating vichyssoise.

In his tell-them-all-off book, Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly , he explains that it was a very cool vichyssoise served to his preciously dressed fourth-grade self on the Queen Mary that launched his interest in the wider possibilities of food.

He was on a trans-Atlantic voyage with his family when a "very patient" British waiter carefully ladled the soup from a silver tureen into his bowl. He can still recall the crunch of the chopped-chive garnish and the rich, creamy taste of potato and leek.

But it was the "pleasurable shock" that it was cold that had the biggest impact. After all, working class boy that he is, he’d grown up, like most of us, on Campbell’s cream of tomato and chicken noodle, and that was soup.

Not that it launched a food career, but I would cast my first taste of vichyssoise in a similar arena. It was the start of a magnificent lunch at the venerable old landmark, Top of the Mark, in the Mark Hopkins Hotel on San Francisco’s Nob Hill. The prairie girl from Edmonton had never before been so engaged in a bowl of soup.

A close second was my first taste of a wondrous gazpacho at the little restaurant in front of the Jai-alai Palace in Tijuana, Mexico, not far from where the Caesar salad was born. Again, it was a crazy paradox of delight on all levels – taste, sensation, satisfaction – that cooled down the parched afternoon heat for hours.

For most Canadians, cold soup is an oxymoron that sounds well, cool, but weird. Certainly nothing you’d whip up at home.

Well, let’s change all that my friends, for with all the fresh produce around and global warming feeling more like global scorching these days, you can make a full-on summer supper with cold soups for main course and dessert. Vary your textures by adding a crisp salad and some snappy flatbreads and crackers, and enjoy the cooler counterpoint to good old Campbell’s without getting into a sweat.

Gazpacho from the hills of San Diego

There are about as many ways of making gazpacho as there are kitchens, but my first experience, as mentioned above, was a full-on Mexican version you could also find in restaurants throughout its cross-border cousin, San Diego. While gazpacho originated in Spain – in Andalusia, to be exact – as a white-coloured soup made from stale bread with not even a whiff of tomato, the recipe below is from a dynamic Mexican friend who lived in San Diego all her adult life. It’s as colourful and savory as Mexico and, bonus, it’s easy to make. Best served next day.

Olga’s gazpacho

3 lb (6 cups) fresh, ripe tomatoes, peeled and cut into chunks

1 medium onion, cut into chunks

1/2 cup green pepper chunks

1/2 cup cucumber chunks

2 cups tomato juice

1 clove of garlic, finely chopped (or more to taste)

1/2 tsp. cumin – make sure it’s fresh

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. pepper

1/4 cup good olive oil

1/4 cup white wine vinegar

To peel the tomatoes, blanche them by pouring boiling water over them. Let them stand a minute, then cool with cold water and the skins will easily peel away. In a blender or food processor, combine the first four ingredients until they are smooth, then transfer to a large tureen. Add juice, garlic, cumin, salt and pepper. Cover and chill well, overnight if possible. Before serving stir in the olive oil and vinegar. Serve cold, with 1/2 cup finely chopped green onion, 1/2 cup finely chopped green pepper and 1/2 cup croutons, preferably homemade, as garnishes. Serves 8.

Classic vichyssoise

The origins of vichyssoise aren’t quite as clear as gazpacho’s, but the final result makes for no less impressive dining on a patio on a warm summer night. Some question whether vichyssoise is French in origin, or the creation of New York chef, Louis Diat, who served it up at the Ritz-Carlton in 1917, naming it after his hometown of Vichy. Again, there are about as many recipes for vichyssoise as there are cooks. The one below is a delicious albeit rich classic from Gourmet .

Crème vichyssoise glacée

Slice very finely 1 medium onion and the white parts of 4 leeks. Sauté the vegetables in 2 tbsp. of butter until they just begin to turn brown. Add 5 medium potatoes, peeled and sliced, 1 quart of chicken broth or water (or both) and 1 tbsp. salt. Bring to a boil and simmer gently for 35-40 minutes. Rub the mixture through a fine sieve and return to the heat, adding 2 cups milk and 2 cups light cream. Season to taste and bring the soup to a boil. Cool it and rub it through a very fine sieve, or a regular sieve will do. When it’s cold, add 1 cup of heavy (whipping) cream. Serve in cups with those finely chopped chives Tony Bourdain still remembers. Serves 8.

Tutti-frutti adventures

My husband grew up on fruit soups his mom learned to make from her mom in Poland. The rest of the Canadian-Polish community in 1960s Vancouver loved fruit soups, too. They were tart surprises, based on fresh blueberries, blackberries, raspberries or apples – whatever was in season – with a splash of cream or milk added for counterpoint. These two melon-base variations from Carol Gelles’ 1000 Vegetarian Recipes make a memorable easy start or end to a summer meal.

Minted honeydew soup

4 cups cut-up honeydew

1 cup apple juice

1/4 up fresh mint leaves

In a 2-quart saucepan, bring the honeydew and juice to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes. Place the melon mixture and mint in a blender or food processor. Cover and process until smooth (you may have to do two batches) Chill. Makes 3 cups; serves 4. For a variation, omit the mint and add 1/2 cup cut-up peeled kiwifruit instead.

Ginger-cantaloupe soup

4 cups cut-up cantaloupe

1 cup orange juice

1 tbsp, fresh minced ginger or 1/2 tsp, ground ginger

In a 2-quart saucepan bring the cantaloupe, juice and ginger to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes. Process in a blender or food processor until smooth. Chill. Serves 4. Try adding 1-2 tbsp. of good rum. Or fill wide shallow bowls with half cantaloupe/half honeydew soup.

Glenda Bartosh is an award-winning freelance writer whose dog loves cold chicken soup.