48 Fun Facts About Soup

Which thick Córdoban purée of tomato, olive oil and garlic is topped with jamón serrano?

Salmorejo, from Córdoba in Andalusia, is a dense purée of tomato, olive oil and garlic, thicker than gazpacho, traditionally topped with diced jamón serrano.

In Old French, what did 'soupe' originally mean?

Soupe in Old French meant bread soaked in liquid: a slice of bread with broth poured over it was the dish itself, and French onion soup with its raft of baguette is a direct survivor.

How did Escoffier divide soups?

Escoffier split soups into clear and thick, a scheme set out in his 1903 Le Guide Culinaire; the thick group takes in purées, veloutés and cream soups.

Which American company introduced condensed canned soup in 1897?

Campbell's launched condensed soup in 1897; with most of the water removed, a can was cheaper to ship and stock and sold for a dime against competitors' 30 cents.

Who worked out how to condense soup commercially in 1897?

John T. Dorrance, a chemist with degrees from MIT and a doctorate from Göttingen, joined his uncle's firm in 1897 and devised condensed soup by removing most of the water; he later bought the company outright.

Where did the red-and-white colour scheme of the condensed-soup cans come from?

A university football uniform inspired it: in 1898 company treasurer Herberton Williams saw Cornell play in carnelian red and white and proposed the colours for the label.

Which artist's 1962 paintings of soup cans became a pop art icon?

Andy Warhol's 32 soup-can canvases, one for each variety then sold, were shown at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles in July 1962 and became a defining image of pop art.

In which year was the company behind condensed soup founded in Camden, New Jersey?

The company was founded in 1869 in Camden, New Jersey, by a fruit merchant and an icebox manufacturer; condensed soup came 28 years later.

Where can the origins of ramen be traced to?

Yokohama Chinatown, where Chinese immigrants sold wheat noodles in broth in the late 1800s, is the usual starting point of ramen's history; Tokyo's Rairaiken popularised the dish from 1910.

What gives ramen noodles their yellow colour and springy bite?

Kansui, alkaline mineral water rich in sodium and potassium carbonate, gives ramen noodles their yellow tint and springy bite by changing how the wheat gluten behaves.

Who invented instant noodles in 1958?

Momofuku Ando, founder of Nissin, launched Chikin Ramen in 1958 and followed it with Cup Noodles in 1971; the Cup Noodles Museum in Ikeda, Osaka, commemorates him.

Which Japanese city is the birthplace of miso ramen?

Sapporo's Aji no Sanpei restaurant is credited with creating miso ramen in the mid-1950s by stirring miso into a pork broth; the style spread across Japan in the 1960s.

Which country is pho from?

Pho is from Vietnam, emerging around Hanoi in the early 1900s; its broth is simmered for hours with bones, charred onion and ginger, star anise and cinnamon.

Which kind of noodle goes into pho?

Flat rice noodles, bánh phở, go into the bowl; their width varies by region, and the broth is simmered with bones, charred onion and ginger and spices.

How does southern Vietnamese pho differ from the northern version?

Southern pho is sweeter and cloudier, often with rock sugar in the broth and a pile of bean sprouts, chilli, hoisin and herbs; northern pho keeps the broth clear and the garnishes minimal.

Which vegetable gives borscht its colour?

Beetroot gives borscht its deep red colour; the soup is served hot in winter and chilled in summer, often with sour cream, and there are green and white variants made without beets.

Which country's borscht tradition did UNESCO list as intangible heritage in need of urgent safeguarding?

Ukraine's borscht-cooking culture was inscribed on 1 July 2022, months into the Russian invasion, on UNESCO's urgent-safeguarding list, with the war's threat to the tradition cited.

Before its familiar red vegetable, what plant was borscht originally made from?

Common hogweed stems, leaves and flower buds were fermented into the original sour soup; the Slavic word borshch itself meant hogweed, and the familiar red version came centuries later.

Gazpacho is served at what temperature?

Gazpacho is served cold, often chilled for hours, as a summer dish from Andalusia in southern Spain.

When were tomatoes added to gazpacho?

Tomatoes only joined gazpacho in the 19th century, long after they reached Spain from the Americas; the older Andalusian version was a pale soup built on olive oil, vinegar, garlic and water.

Which ingredient thickens a traditional gazpacho?

Stale bread, soaked and pounded with oil, vinegar and garlic, thickens a traditional gazpacho, to which tomato, cucumber and pepper are added; it began as food for Andalusian farm labourers.

Which French port is bouillabaisse from?

Marseille is the home of bouillabaisse, which began as a fishermen's dish made from the bony rockfish they could not sell; a 1980 charter by the city's restaurateurs codified the recipe.

What does the name 'bouillabaisse' literally describe?

Bouillabaisse is usually traced to Provençal bolhir, 'to boil', and abaissar, 'to lower', describing boiling then lowering the heat as each fish goes in; rascasse, the scorpion fish, is the one fish every traditional version insists on.

What is rouille, served with bouillabaisse?

Rouille is a garlic and saffron mayonnaise spiked with cayenne, whose rust colour gives it its name; it is spread on grilled bread and floated on the broth.

What is the main difference between New England and Manhattan clam chowder?

The tomato version is a long-running culinary insult in New England. Both are properly full of clams and potato.

According to Alexandre Dumas, how did onion soup reach the French royal court?

Louis XV's father-in-law Stanislas was the enthusiast. Onions had until then been regarded as peasant food.

Which stock is normally used in French onion soup?

Beef stock is the classic base for French onion soup; the onions are first cooked slowly in butter until deeply golden, and the bowl is topped with bread and grated Gruyère under a grill.

How was onion soup regarded socially before the 18th century?

Onion soup was peasant food, avoided by the rich: onions were cheap, plentiful and thought to cause bad breath, until 18th-century court enthusiasm made the soup fashionable.

What are the two basic components of miso soup?

Miso soup's two basic components are fermented soybean paste, the miso, and dashi stock; the paste is whisked in off the boil so its aroma and live cultures are not destroyed.

Which of these is a common base for the dashi in miso soup?

Dried kelp, kombu, is the classic dashi base, often paired with katsuobushi bonito flakes; niboshi sardines or dried shiitake do the same job, and the stock takes minutes rather than hours.

Which seaweed is the classic partner of tofu in a bowl of miso soup?

Wakame, a soft brown seaweed sold dried or salted, is the standard partner for cubes of tofu in miso soup, rehydrating in the hot stock within minutes.

What are the nests in bird's nest soup actually made of?

The nests are solidified swiftlet saliva: the birds secrete strands of sticky saliva that harden into a cup, which is cleaned of feathers and dissolved into a gelatinous soup.

Which Fujian soup of abalone, sea cucumber and scallops simmers for hours in a sealed jar?

Buddha Jumps Over the Wall, from Fuzhou in Fujian, layers abalone, sea cucumber, scallops and other luxuries in a sealed jar simmered for hours; legend says its aroma tempted a meditating monk over a wall.

Where were edible nests traditionally harvested?

Limestone caves in Borneo, above all Gomantong in Sabah and Niah in Sarawak, were the traditional harvest sites, with collectors climbing rattan ladders; purpose-built nesting houses took over from the 1990s.

The name 'mulligatawny' comes from Tamil words meaning what?

Mulligatawny comes from Tamil milagu tannir, 'pepper water', a thin peppery broth that British cooks in Madras thickened with flour and bulked out with chicken or mutton in the 1800s.

What is a consommé?

A consommé is a clarified clear soup: a rich stock made perfectly transparent; the French word means 'consumed' or 'completed', and producing one was a classic test of a cook.

What is used to clarify a consommé?

Egg whites, whisked with lean minced meat and vegetables, form a raft as the stock heats; the coagulating protein traps the cloudy particles and rises, leaving crystal-clear liquid beneath.

Which Polish soup is made from fermented rye flour and served with white sausage?

Żurek is Poland's sour rye soup, made from a starter of fermented rye flour and water, served with white sausage and potato, and at Easter often presented in a hollowed loaf.

Why was shark fin soup served at Chinese weddings and business banquets?

Its price signalled wealth and prestige: shark fin was one of the costly 'treasures of the sea' that Qing-era banquet manuals expected a host to serve, so offering it honoured the guests.

In the Thai name tom yum, what does the word 'tom' refer to?

Tom means boiling (or boiled) in Thai and yam a spicy mixed salad, so tom yum is a boiled spicy-sour soup; nam sai is the clear style and nam khon the creamy one with evaporated milk.

Filé powder, one of gumbo's traditional thickeners, is made from the dried leaves of which tree?

Sassafras leaves, dried and ground, make filé powder, a Choctaw contribution stirred in after the gumbo comes off the heat so it thickens without turning stringy; okra is the other classic thickener.

Cullen skink, the thick Scottish soup, is built around which smoked fish?

Smoked haddock, ideally finnan haddie, is the heart of Cullen skink, simmered with potatoes, onion and milk; the soup takes its name from Cullen, a fishing town on the Moray Firth.

Chef Louis Diat invented chilled vichyssoise while head chef at which New York hotel?

The Ritz-Carlton on Madison Avenue was Diat's kitchen when he introduced vichyssoise in 1917, chilling his mother's leek-and-potato soup and naming it after Vichy, near his home town.

Mexican menudo is a red-chilli soup made from which part of the cow?

Stomach lining, tripe, is the base of menudo, simmered for hours with hominy in a red chilli broth and served with lime, onion and oregano; the unrelated Filipino menudo is a pork and liver stew.

Greek avgolemono soup is thickened with lemon juice and what?

The name literally means egg-lemon. Magiritsa, a lamb-offal version, is eaten to break the fast at the end of Great Lent.

Traditional cock-a-leekie soup is finished with which dried fruit?

Prunes are the traditional finish, added whole or sliced to the chicken-and-leek broth; the dish may descend from a French chicken-and-onion soup, with leeks replacing onions by the late 1500s.

Harira, the Moroccan and Algerian soup, is most associated with which observance?

Harira is the soup of Ramadan in Morocco and Algeria, eaten with dates to break the daily fast at sunset; its tomato, lentil and chickpea base can be made year-round.

Caldo verde, a potato and shredded-cabbage soup served with chouriço, comes from which country?

Caldo verde comes from Portugal, originally the Minho region in the north, and is eaten at weddings and festivals with slices of broa, a cornbread; the name means green broth.