Growing up in the sixties, my mother was always trying to use the modern conveniences of the world to stretch our food dollar and still put food in our tummies. She would come up with odd concoctions that were downright delicious, some of which, like goulash, I still make.
When the winter turned cold, it was time for hot breakfasts. I still remember all us kids getting up in the morning, the smell of oatmeal or Cream of Wheat filling the house, along with the requisite buttered toast to go right along with it. I don’t think my mom was anti-protein; it was just that these foodstuffs could fill up four ravenous boys so much more easily.
On those rare days that it snowed, we would fill up on breakfast and head out. Eventually, hunger would strike and we would return. Lunch many times would be grilled cheese and tomato soup, a family favorite.
I was and am still a fan of tomato soup. It has to be the creamy variety, not the watery kind. And it has to be accompanied by grilled cheese or it just won’t cut it. I have never really cared for many other types of soup, though I profess a weakness today for the gnocci and chicken soup at Olive Garden and a very occasional cup of clam chowder (white, never red).
There are two reasons why I am not a soup fan. Well, three really.
When I was growing up, my mother, like most mothers of the time, loved the convenience of Campbell Soups. It was the origins of our tomato soup, the can-shaped blob of condensed tomato plopping into a pan, waiting for a can or two of milk to join it.
She would also serve up other soups from the Campbell family. Chicken noodle, of course, then alphabet soup. We even had some really odd soups that were green. I think they were broccoli, as if turning broccoli into a soup would ever convince kids it was delicious.
Cream of mushroom was used liberally with pork chops and in green bean casserole. I still love green bean casserole, so Campbell’s still manages to get some of my money at the holidays. But for the most part, soups of the era were way too salty for my tastes, and while fascinated by the golden blobs that would gather on the top of the chicken noodle soup, I always wondered deep down what it was. Even in my advanced years, I’m still not sure.
I initially I thought it was all Campbell’s fault that I didn’t really like any other soups beside tomato. In Bachelor Homemaking class, we tackled potato soup once. My classmates and I dutifully chopped up the potatoes and made the creamy stock. We only had an hour to do it so it took a lot of coordination and teamwork.
When we finished, we gleefully sat down at the table we had set and readied ourselves to enjoy the fruit, or should I say soup, of our labor. The teacher walked by, looking at our soup. She was impressed, particularly because we were the first in the class to sit down to enjoy our meal. The others were still slaving over their respective burners.
We dove in. The stock was creamy and well seasoned, yum. Then we noticed a problem. The cubes of potato were still raw. They hadn’t softened at all. Undeterred, we crunched our way through the soup, looking at each other knowingly as we feigned a smile of delight for the teacher to see.
It still didn’t turn me away from soup completely. But I was close. The clincher came in my senior year. As I have documented here, I came down with mono and ended up in the hospital. With a couple of kissing tonsils, I was on a liquid diet for seven days. That meant brothy soup for breakfast, soup for lunch and surprise, soup for dinner. If they had served dessert I’m sure it would have been in soup form.
I think that a week of soup, especially hospital soup, will cure anyone of their love of this liquidious food. The only highlight of the week was when my mother smuggled in a large vanilla shake from Jack in the Box. A shake has never tasted so good, not before, not since.
When I got home, I thought I could begin to go back to my standard culinary life. But no, I still had no bloody appetite. Since I couldn’t think of anything I really wanted to eat, I would hear the characteristic whirring of the electric can opener in the kitchen. I knew what it meant. More soup.
Worse, it was chicken noodle soup. I know this is the default in our world for people who are sick. I’m not really sure how it has any healing powers. It doesn’t look good to me when I am healthy.
There is only one healing soup on this earth. And no, it’s not tomato. It’s Hot and Sour soup. I learned this from my lifelong friend Cassie who made me try it in a restaurant once. It was delicious, even though it had blocks of bean curd in it. At least they were soft.
When I got sick once, she brought some Hot & Sour soup home from our favorite Chinese restaurant. By the time I had finished my first bowl all the pores in my body had been cleared, my sinuses had dried up and my sore throat had disappeared. I’m not really certain of the miracle of Hot & Sour soup, but even today I will hunt around for some if I feel the Creeping Crud coming on.
Soup certainly has its place in our world. It just doesn’t have a place in my cupboards. I think we’re both good with the fact that we won’t be spooning any time soon.
Out on the Treasure Coast, craving a grilled cheese right now but I don’t have any tomato soup,
– Robb