Cold Soup

Mild potatoes contrast with the earthy tones of arugula in a lightly curried soup.

This brightly colored soup makes a delightful introduction to a summer dinner, or it can be the centerpiece of a light meal accompanied by salad-filled wraps.

This is a soup I had years ago at an inn in Peacham, Vermont, when my husband, Evan, and I were looking for recipes for our book on new New England cooking. It is so delectable that every year now I celebrate the coming of the blueberries by making myself this soup. And, of course, I am blessed by having my cousin John tap our maple trees in the spring, so there is always maple syrup in my larder.

This is ideal to make when you’ve bought too much watermelon.

This is really another take on the preceding vegetable soup, but it differs enough in detail to warrant a full-dress recipe. It is without question one of my favorite soups, and I usually plant a couple of rows of leeks in my garden so I can indulge myself at a moment’s notice. This is one soup in which I prefer to use water rather than stock, so that nothing interferes with the sweet, pronounced flavor of the leeks.

These ingredients all strike floral notes and to my mind are a natural combination. Raspberries contribute sweetness; champagne, acidity; rose water, depth of flavor; and the apricots, texture.

I’ve adapted this dessert from one of Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s recipes. It starts with his base soup, and I’ve added the tanginess of yogurt and the toasted nuttiness of sesame for depth of flavor and contrasting textures.

Maybe I like rhubarb so much because I started eating it when I was a child; my mother’s strawberry-rhubarb pie is one of my earliest memories. And I love summer fruit soups; that’s something I learned from François Payard. So this combination is a natural for me. You need just the pod from the vanilla bean for this dessert, so if you have saved some used pods, now is the time to recycle. And you will need a whipped cream charger (see page 279) for the foam. You will have leftover consommé (which you can freeze) and foam; you simply can’t successfully foam less liquid than is in the recipe.

Muscat grapes mark the beginning of spring, and they’re a prompt for me to start thinking of new menus, new ideas, and the other spring fruits to come. This soup is designed to keep the distinct musky flavor of these grapes in its purest form. “Cape” refers to the papery husk the gooseberries are wrapped in, which makes them look like tiny Chinese lanterns.

After tomato, basil, and mozzarella, prosciutto and melon just might be the most classic Italian flavor combination of all time. It gets a whole new lease on life, though, when served as a savory cold soup. The tomato contributes a bit of acidity that tones down the melon’s natural sweetness, and salty prosciutto makes the whole dish sing. If you can’t find canned San Marzano tomatoes, which are a bit sweeter than regular canned plum tomatoes, go for an organic brand such as Muir Glen.

Serve this chilled fruit soup as a light summer appetizer or with your favorite sandwich or salad.

When I interviewed Gilles Choukroun, one of the darlings of a new generation of French chefs who are injecting playfulness into French food, he had just opened the Mini Palais, a beautiful restaurant in Paris’s newly renovated Grand Palais exhibition hall, across from Les Invalides. In addition to his nascent restaurant empire, Gilles is also the father of Generation C, which stands for “Cuisines et Culture,” a group of chefs who teach cooking to the disadvantaged in Paris. Gilles, whose father is a Jew from Algeria, experiments with the spices and flavors of North Africa to accent his French food. One of his signature desserts is this refreshing citrus-fruit soup. It makes the perfect ending to a North African meal, especially with cookies on the side.

Beets and beet soup are as old as the Talmud, in which the dish is mentioned. Borscht, brought to France most recently by Russian immigrants before World War I, is still very popular served either hot or cold, depending on the season. Although there is a meat version, made with veal bones and thickened with eggs and vinegar, I prefer this lighter, dairy beet soup. The French use a bit more vinegar and less sugar than in American recipes, proportions that allow the beet flavor really to shine through. The soup is traditionally topped with dill or chervil, but I use whatever is growing seasonally in my garden, often fresh mint. The combination of the bright-pink beets, the sour cream or yogurt, and the green herbs makes a stunning dish.

I love to make this soup in the summer, when my garden (or the local farmers market) is bursting with cucumbers and tomatoes and the weather is balmy. The first time I had this soup, or a version of it, was in the Maldives, at the Cocoa Island resort on the South Male Atoll, just southwest of India. For the soup, the chef, Stana Johnson, had combined South Indian seasonings and the notion of North India’s favorite cucumber raita, a yogurt relish, to fashion a light summery, cooling soup. I remember sitting in an airy pavilion, the calm blue sea on two sides of me, balmy breezes blowing past, sipping the soup a tablespoon at a time, and thinking, “This is what heaven must be like.” While the flavors were easy on the tongue, the soup was complicated to make. I have spent two years simplifying it, trying to retain its essence while cutting down on all the steps a large-staffed restaurant can do with ease. I like to serve the soup with a dollop of Yogurt Rice, page 26 or 217, right in its center. This is not essential. Just a light sprinkling of diced cucumbers and diced cherry tomatoes will do. But do try it once with the Yogurt Rice as well as the sprinkling of cucumbers and tomatoes. (You do not actually have to make the full Yogurt Rice recipe. A very quick version, made with leftover rice, follows.)

A refreshing summer soup from Iran.

I made notes about this recipe and a few others at Haci Abdullah’s restaurant in Istanbul. It is a cool summer soup using rural staples, and it takes only minutes to make.

This salad is popular throughout the Middle East. Unless it is to be eaten as soon as it is made, it is best to salt the cucumber and let the juices drain before mixing with the yogurt; otherwise it gets very watery. If possible, use the small cucumbers sold in Middle Eastern and Asian stores—they have a finer flavor than the large ones. Cacik is served as part of a meze and also as a side dish—to be eaten with spoons from little individual side bowls—to accompany pies, meat dishes, and rice. It even makes a lovely cold summer soup. Use plain whole-milk yogurt.

Here’s a great way to take advantage of late summer’s sublime tomatoes. Use the ripest tomatoes possible.

Here’s another nearly-instant cold soup. While cucumbers may not be the most nutritious of vegetables, they are undoubtedly one of the most refreshing. On a very hot day, if you want to be as cool as one, serve this lilting cucumber soup.