French Onion Soup and Other Unique Soups from Many Countries – Soups can be considered as comfort foods. People love soups because some soup recipes are easy to make. These do not require special cooking skills that will involve complicated processes. Mostly, the soup depends on the stock and it can be many kinds of stocks. Then, there are vegetables to make the dishes healthier and more flavorful. Soups have many variations and each country may have different recipes of soups. In this case, it is great things to know some nice and tasty soups.
French onion soup is nice soup to start the discussion. Onion soups are not something strange. For ages, onion soups become popular choices. As its name, strong flavor of onions can be found in each spoon of the soup. However, based on the history, onion soup was considered as the food for the poor. However, onion soup was transformed when it enter restaurant in Les Halles market in Paris. After that, onion soup no longer cheap and simple food. The restaurant turns the soup into something tastier and more luxurious and one of the reasons is gratin. The soup becomes richer in flavor with gooey texture. It even gets gruyere cheese to give richer and creamier taste. Beef stocks combined with caramelized onions become other sources of the flavorful sensation. That is why this is known as French onion soup because the makeover happened in France. Now, it is no longer soup for the poor but it even can be found in luxurious restaurants.
Chicken tortilla soup is tasty Mexican soup. It may have the name of chicken soup, but it is different from the common chicken soup. The chicken tortilla soup has become one of the traditional Mexican meals. Although it is considered as traditional meals, there is no clear history regarding the recipe. It is said that it came from Mexico City and the soup combines all delicious flavors that Mexican people love. It still uses chicken stock as the base. Then, it is added with onion, chiles, garlic, and roasted tomatoes. The base becomes richer with these additional ingredients, especially with the chiles and the roasted tomatoes. Then, it can be added with chicken meat, corn, and beans. Because it is chicken tortilla soup, it will not be complete without tortilla. Thus, the fried tortilla is added to give crunchy texture in the soup. As the results, rich and flavorful tastes of soup can be found and even kids can enjoy the foods.
Those who love thick and even creamy soup the butternut squash soup can be nice choice. The soup is popular during fall where butternut squash can be found. In fact, it is also almost similar to butternut squash puree. However, it is thinned out to get smoother taste and the one to do it is the chicken stock. With the stock, the thick puree can be smoother and it has savory taste. This type of soup may not be found in all seasons because it has other seasonal ingredients such as apples and root vegetables although now farming technology makes seasonal ingredients can be nurtured and cultivated in different seasons. Nowadays, the butternut squash soup is combined with bacons to get saltiness and crispiness.
Next, it is good to see what Scotland offers for the variation of soup. There is Scottish soup. People also call it as Scotch broth. The same ingredients are cooked in other countries and it is known as beef and barley soup. Barley becomes main ingredient and it is accompanied by root vegetables. As for the meat, it uses the beef or lamb chuck cooked with slow-cooking method to get tenderness of the meat. Slow and low cooking will give nice textures on the ingredients. It is not only to make the meat tender, but barley can be chewy. The broth tastes lighter and hearty.
Split pea soup may not be quite familiar for you. Some people may not be interested to enjoy the soup and even it is considered as unappetizing. One of the reasons is about the split pea that is not quite popular among legumes. However, people start to change their opinion. The problem is mostly because of the wrong method in cooking the split pea. When it is prepared well with mirepoix and fresh herbs, the split pea will not be bland anymore and even it gives hearty texture that will make the soup special. It is no different form lentil soups and it can be combined with ham or meats chopped into smaller cubes.
For the last reference, you can have cream of mushroom soup. The name is quite unique. The soup emphasizes on the characteristic of mushrooms. The ingredients produce umami taste. Then it has meaty texture that even can make the mushrooms replacements of meats. This is going to be nice can creamy soup with umami taste. The creamy texture comes from the cream and roux. The mushrooms are roasted first to get the umami flavor and it is added to the soup together with thyme, onion, and garlic to give stronger flavor. This is creamy and tasty soup that will be great during the cold weather.