Bowl me over

Often associated with cold, wet nights in the West and that thin flavoured water that one has as a side dish to rice over here, soups are often cast in a supporting role in a meal. Sure they are ideal for leftovers and odd bits, but that doesn’t mean they are simply a dumping ground for the unimaginative cook or need to play second fiddle to the meat and two veg.

You can easily tote soup over to the office for lunch in a good quality wide-mouth thermos flask. The soup keeps warm for several hours and sustains me through the afternoon without making me drowsy.

Today, I packed an onion and lima bean soup. It starts from a recipe by Jacques Pépin for Onion Soup Gratinée, but I leave out the cheese, bread slices and baking. I also used homemade vegetable stock as I was giving some of the soup to a vegetarian friend.

The onions needs to be sliced a little thinner than they appear in the picture, but this is what happens when you’re in a hurry because you’ve already turned on the stove and the oil/butter in the saucepan has started to smoke.

Also, you can’t just put the onion slices in and then forget about them. Read that new cooking magazine with all the lovely Italian recipes if you must but try to remember to look into the pot now and then or you’ll end up with burnt onions and a dark broth. Not that the soup was ruined, though it could have tasted less scorched.

In ‘The Soup Nazi’ episode, Jerry Seinfeld was referring to a bisque, if I’m not mistaken, but he could have been talking about this soup too when he said, ‘You can’t eat this soup standing up, your knees buckle.’


Onion and Lima Bean Soup
2 servings

1 tbsp butter + 1 tbsp vegetable oil
170g white onions, sliced into thin half moons
100g baby lima beans, soaked for at least 6 hours
3½ cups stock (use a beef stock cube if desired)
1 dried bay leaf
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

In a large saucepan, sauté the onions in the butter/oil over medium heat until lightly brown, about 8 minutes. Add the rest of the ingredients and boil gently for 20 minutes or until beans are tender but still firm. Remove bay leaf before serving.