Soup "by the nose" — an aromatic "recipe"
This summer-time soup meets two criteria to make it au pistou; a third — people to share it with — makes it FRIENDSHIP FOOD
Bonjour! Bonjour!
Even as the days are getting longer and warmer here — we’re full into the season of packed café terraces and picnics in the park — when friends get together, there’s still soup. Some of my friends (those with roomy closets) have ceramic soup tureens and pretty ladles that they bring to the table. Some bring their big pots — it’s what I do. And all of us take pleasure in sharing what feels as primal as bread. Soup knows no seasons — it’s always welcome. It can be celebration food — think of all the traditional wedding soups — or comforting food for tumultuous times. And because it’s inherently communal — a pot of soup is not a meal for one – I’m making soup, specifically Soupe au Pistou, the chunky Provençal vegetable soup run through with garlicky pureed basil, our FRIENDSHIP FOOD recipe for June. Also, as I do every time I send you a FRIENDSHIP FOOD recipe, I make a donation in honor of xoxoDorie readers. This month, I’m once again contributing to World Central Kitchen, which continues to provide food to those in desperate need around the globe.
Soupe au Pistou – again
It was only after I’d made soupe au pistou for friends, when Michael was washing the pot and I was putting away the bowls that I realized that last year, at the end of summer, I sent you a recipe for soupe au pistou (the recipe from Ben Tish is here). Yes, it says something about my memory, but I take it to mean that I love the soup so much that sharing it with you is irresistible. It’s a great soup and also one with an open heart — everyone who makes soupe au pistou adds their own touch based on what they like and what they’ve got, and it’s always good. The soup has history and tradition, but it doesn’t have rules, so in that sense every recipe is personal. When you scroll down, you’ll find the soup that I made. When you make it, it’s bound to be different, and of course I’ll want to know what you did.
Gosh, it sure looks like Minestrone
The two things that make a soupe au pistou a soupe au pistou are abundant vegetables (pasta too) and garlicky, basil pistou, which sounds like pesto and is like pesto, minus the cheese. Well, sometimes minus the cheese. And minus the pinenuts — or not. And that’s the thing about classic recipes that get passed down through generations: They change with the times, as they should; they change with the cooks, as they should; and when they’re taken away from their hometowns, they change to welcome the foodways and the foods of the communities they’ve traveled to, as they should.
I’ve seen recipes that insist that no root vegetables should be included and then the pot is stirred and up pop carrots and turnips, too — both vegetables I like to add to my soup. There are recipes with and without dried beans — white beans, like cannelloni, are a common addition, but so are flageolets and haricots rouge. I like freshly cooked dried beans in the soup, but I like (and most often use) canned beans as well. I sometimes add chickpeas and wonder if, since they’re so popular in the south of France, they weren’t meant to be part of the mix. Most recipes agree on the addition of pasta, but what shape? Small pastas get the majority vote, but broken spaghetti is not unheard of. And the addition of tomatoes is up for grabs too — I add them. There are recipes that say the pistou should be stirred into the soup before it’s ladled out, some that say each souper should stir in their own, and others that instruct you to stir some into the soup and then to pass the rest (it’s what I do). In other words, for every rule, there’s an equal and opposite rule and so there are no rules at all.
And if the soup reminds you of minestrone, it’s no surprise. France and Italy are neighbors — it’s just an hour from the pistou of Nice to the minestrone of Liguria.
Gosh, pistou sure looks like pesto
A soupe au pistou without pistou is just a good vegetable soup, but what goes into the pistou is again your choice. While pesto — I’ll call it Italian pistou and hope not to bring down the wrath of my Italian friends — commonly has basil, garlic, olive oil, pine nuts and grated cheese, the most basic pistou is made with only basil, garlic and oil. If you want to add cheese — do it! If you want to add nuts — I won’t stop you. And if you want to use store-bought pesto — I’ll never say no. The only thing you shouldn’t do is skip the pistou/pesto — it’s not only a definitive part of the soup, it’s a pleasure: Nothing beats the sense of comfort and calm that you get when the hot soup releases the first puff of the pistou’s fragrance. Ah, basil. Ah, garlic.
My soup by the handful
When I headed to the market, I knew I was going to make soupe au pistou, but I didn’t know what I’d find. Also, I didn’t have a recipe with me, so I wasn’t sure how much of anything I’d need. I was going to cook “au pif” — a French expression that means by nose or at random, but that we’d maybe think of as by feel or instinct. And so, when I found something I wanted, I asked the vendor for a handful — une poignée. I came home with handfuls of string beans and broad beans and small potatoes. I bought a bunch of small turnips — they looked so pretty and their leaves were so green; a bunch of spring onions; some new garlic, fresh tender and too young to have developed a skin; and basil with dirt still clinging to its roots that was so aromatic it made my head spin. (I carried it home like a bouquet, breathing in its fragrance as I walked.) I decided that I wanted tomatoes for the soup and chose a few Roma tomatoes, bought two slender zucchinis — maybe because of ratatouille, I think of it as an essential vegetable in Provençal cooking — and filled in the soup with ingredients I had at home. With all of these beautiful vegetables, sunshine out the window and the prospect of soup and friends in my future, slicing the vegetables and stirring the pot was its own kind of comfort, its own source of calm.
Having enjoyed making this bit-of-this-bit-of-that soup, I wrote an au pif recipe (scroll down), so that you can have as much fun as I did making it up as I went along.
I hope you’ll make soupe au pistou now and all through the summer. It’s a good-no-matter-when recipe. But like so many good recipes, it’s better with friends. Make the soup. Put the pot in the center of the table. Ladle out bowlfuls for those around you. And don’t forget to take a moment to smell the pistou — it’s the lagniappe.
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SOUPE AU PISTOU “AU PIF”
Au pif means “by your nose” or “at random” and so, in a sense, this is a no-recipe recipe. Feel free to mix things up depending on what you’ve got on hand and what you like. The only must-haves are a bunch of vegetables and the pistou, which is like pesto and could even be store-bought pesto. If your store-bought pesto is a bit thick, you can thin it with some olive oil.
