The last soup I made for soup swap -- Miso with onion and tofu-- was quick and cheap. This go around, I thought I was making something simple, but it turned out to be one of the most expensive and time consuming simple soups I've ever made. It's ramps season. I love the little wild leek that the food writer Jane Snow described as "like fried green onions with a dash of funky feet." I've sauteed it up, I've scrambled it into eggs, I've made hand pies with it, but I've never cooked it into a soup. Turns out it is a time consuming endeavor. First, you separate the greens from the bulbs. Then you wash each -- the bulbs being the most time consuming, because you have to cut off the roots, wash off the dirt, and peel off the slightly gelatinous caul. Then you chop up the greens and slice up the bulbs, and keep them separate. You sautee the bulbs with Vidalia onions in vegetable oil, til soft, and then add a bunch of dry white wine, and boil that off til the onions and ramps are even more tender. Then you add chicken stock and simmer for another half hour, til even more tender. Then you add the greens, and boil for one minute.
Now, puree the soup in small batches, and pour it through a fine mesh to press out the solids -- until you have a big pot of thin, delicate ramp soup. Now, you heat it up again, and just as it's hot, you whisk in some butter and grated Parmesan cheese.
It's helpful to listen to This American Life and call friends while you're cleaning the ramps bulbs, because that can take a couple hours if you're making enough for 8 quarts. But in the end you'll be left with a delicate, musty, Spring-green, delicious soup -- full of vitamins and purported to ward off the illnesses of winter.
Plus, you gotta love a soup whose name is plural. Ramps!
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