Salt and Pepper Soup

Here in northern California, we usually don't see rain from late March to late October. Brides can confidently plan garden weddings and barbecues are safe from washouts. I forget the actual count, but the San Francisco Giants can count on two hands the total number of rained out home games since they moved here from New York in the 1950s. So, why am I talking about hot soup in what should rightly be our sunniest, hottest month? Well, go figure - we've had rain for the past two days.

Low pressure weather systems tend to mellow me out. I get sleepy and want to snuggle back under the covers in the morning. My afternoon naps lengthen. Energy being low, I also look for easy dinners. Rooting around in the lowest drawer of my freezer, I discovered some butternut squash soup that I squirreled away back when the rains stopped sometime in March.

It seemed a little dull all by itself, although it was layered with the flavor of leeks and corned beef stock, so I decided to add a couple of ears of fresh corn to it and, in a moment of inspired creativity, the rest of a package of spicy salami that had languished in the fridge since the pizza party last weekend. I cut the corn from the cob and made little triangles out of the salami circles and dropped both into the soup for the last five minutes of heating, ladled it into bowls and rang the dinner bell.

The corn added sweetness and a light crunch, the salami contributed both salt and peppery liveliness, plus just a little richness from the fat in the meat. My Beloved finished his bowl in a single inhale, then looked to see if there was more in the pot. There was. Almost enough to make us NOCAs look forward the rains.

Thyme for Corn

I'm reluctant to see the end of the summer corn season because I love fresh corn so much, but even I must admit that plain corn can get a little boring toward the end of the run. So, to jazz it up a little, I tried grilling it and brushing the ears with thyme-infused butter.

We have a Jennair grill but I don't see why a grill pan wouldn't work just as well for this. All I did was melt a little butter and add fresh thyme leaves from the garden, letting the two rest together for about half an hour before brushing the mixture on the corn as it turned dark brown in spots from the grilling. The flavor was still Ripe Corn, but with an added layer of herbal magic. So, if you are sad about the end of corn season, as I am, make some thyme for corn before it's all gone!

Trug Soup

I have an active imagination. When I began my garden, I imagined myself wafting out to my productive little patch, probably wearing a floaty Loretta Youngesque sundress and a picture hat, romantic-looking trug in hand, to harvest all the wonders that Nature would have provided.

Right.

The reality is that I do my harvesting in baggy pants and without a basket, romantic-looking or otherwise, as my two pockets and a single handful pretty much fills the bill. I was pretty resentful of that fact, too, until I made soup one day from the contents of my imaginary trug.

Okay, I did add two red potatoes, a large onion, three garlic cloves, two (Chilebrown) chili peppers, a fennel bulb, four ears of corn and a quart of veggie stock that didn't originate on my property but the fresh thyme, greenie beanies and zucchinis were my very own.

The preparation was the usual for soup - soften the aromatics in olive oil, add the thyme until it becomes fragrant and dump in the stock and the rest of the chopped veggies (except the corn, which I reserved until the end - I like crisp corn) and simmer until you can't wait any longer to ladle it into a bowl for the first taste. Add salt and pepper as you like.

It was dreamy.

Now my romantic vision is of a perfectly set table with the sun setting behind My Beloved's shoulders as we slurp our Trug Soup, holding hands by candlelight. This fantasy is far more likely to come true.

Summer Soup

One of the great things about life in the Bay area is that even the summers are relatively cool. That means we can happily eat hot soup year 'round, with only a few days being too hot for a bowl of broth.

Corn chowder is a favorite of mine, especially when made with the sweet, crisp kernels of fresh summer corn. My recipe comes from Elna, my first husband's mother, who had it from her mother, who had it from her mother, and so on back into time. Elna was a marvelous cook and a generous one - she shared all her recipes with me.

This is actually pretty basic corn chowder, made by sauteing five slices of chopped bacon in a heavy soup pot, then adding the chopped celery and onion until they are soft, followed by milk and red potato dice, raw corn kernels removed from the cobs, salt and pepper, and cooking it all together on simmer for about half an hour. You can enrich it with cream if you like but it's pretty nice just as is.

Over the years, I have tweaked the recipe a little. I now add fresh thyme from my garden, just the leaves of a few nice sprigs to round out the flavors, and I reserve the bacon bits rather than cook them with the soup, sprinkling them on at serving time to add a little bit of crispy crunch to the bowl.

I served it to Jan and Ted, friends visiting this week from St. Louis who came in late and starving from their flight - there is nothing remotely edible on airlines these days - and they loved it! Summer can be such a fine season for soup!