You can bitch about Portland's weather, or you can embrace
the rain for its opportune culinary ambience. Coffee is obviously
superior to tea, but do you know how lovely and necessary
afternoon tea is in England? Can you imagine how stiff and
crotchety Brits would get without their cheek-flushing ritual?
Let me suggest that Portlanders adopt a similar practice to
get through the wet and raw season, but with soup as the centerpiece
of an afternoon break. In her book Soup: A Way of Life,
Barbara Kafka writes, "When I am tired and want comfort, when
I want to share happiness, or when I want flavor, my first
desire is soup." Well, it might not be my first desire,
but if the taste is correct, soup is unfailingly soothing--and
particularly fortifying against a backdrop of inclement weather.
To prepare for the long season ahead, we sampled several bowls
of zuppa around town and spoke with four chefs behind
the best broth.
Old Wives' Tales (1300 E Burnside St., 238-0470)
has been dishing out Hungarian mushroom soup since Holly
Hart opened the restaurant 20 years ago. "Any day that we
didn't have the mushroom, people were disappointed. It became
the soup we had to have," she says. Today, Hart reports
that they sell anywhere between 10 and 30 gallons of the
stuff daily, and that some customers buy it by the gallon
for parties and Thanksgiving feasts. The formula is based
on a recipe from The Moosewood Cookbook. Hart attributes
its popularity in part to the base, which is sour cream
instead of plain old cream, lending a more textured richness.
During soup season (October-May), Old Wives' offers four
soups every day: the mushroom, clam chowder and two meat-
and dairy-free options (one is spicy, the other mild). All
are made from scratch (some restaurants use kits or manufactured
stocks). Hart's dedication to vegans and vegetarians is
evident: Ingredient lists are posted at the self-serve bar,
and diners are free to taste-test a soup before ordering.
The current chefs, Pascal Chureau and Edward Lewis, choose
from a repertoire of about 50 soups, including Cajun vegetable
and bean, sweet and sour borscht and Florentine white bean.
If you've never tried the mushroom, which is spiced with
dill and paprika, start small -- this thick mélange
gives new meaning to the word hearty.
Greg Higgins, of Higgins Restaurant (1239 SW Broadway,
222-9070), was busy chopping up shallots for a forest mushroom
potage when we spoke with him. He pointed out that
soup epitomizes utilitarian cooking; the soups at Higgins--and
many restaurants--revolve around what's in the walk-in cooler.
Higgins does not boast a signature soup but offers two varieties
daily--one of which is always vegetarian, often vegan. In
the summer, gazpacho is a fixture on the regular menu, and
the other two soups feature a range in texture--one a purée,
the other chunky--such as caramelized onion and squash,
eggplant in broth or vegetable with chorizo. Higgins says
the most important piece to crafting a fine soup is just
sound cooking technique. "You need a good intuitive knowledge
of cooking to be able to bring out the flavors of vegetables.
Soups are really quite simple, but if one of those components
is out of whack, the whole becomes unbalanced," he explains.
The restaurant's insistence on using local, organic, sustainable
ingredients helps to maintain a delicious equilibrium.
John Burrows is nothing like the Soup Nazi. He wants you
to have all the soup you want, he doles it out with a grin
and kind comments and will hand out recipes to any who ask.
"Soup should be shared," he declares. A year ago in August,
John's Catering grew to include the Soup Station (520
NW 12th Ave., 228-2466), a Pearl District lunch spot that
serves takeout sandwiches and soups Monday through Friday.
Burrows, who has been an army cook in Vietnam, an apprentice
at the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco and a cook at
the Benson Hotel, established the catering side and waited
for his daughter Rebecca--"the stabilizing force in the
business"--to graduate from college before expanding to
the Station. He says Portland was lacking in the soup department,
and apparently he was right: Sales have steadily risen each
month since the restaurant's opening. Customers can choose
among five soups daily. The signature items, tomato bisque
and vegetarian chili, are always on the menu, along with
a soup anchored to each day of the week--Wednesday's Madras
curry is especially popular--and two other seasonal specials.
"A lot aren't planned until we check with the produce supplier
the night before to see what's good and fresh," he explains.
The Burrowses claim a loyal and savvy following. "Once we
used a Roma tomato base [instead of pear tomato] for the
bisque, and people noticed the difference," says Mr. Burrows,
"You can't mess with it."
Go for the house soup at the Heathman Restaurant ensconced
in the downtown hotel (1001 SW Broadway, 790-7752) and you'll
get a petite meal. The signature seafood bisque is a thick,
tomato-fennel soup with chunks of salmon, halibut and shrimp.
Other specialties, such as cream of mushroom, are similarly
satisfying. The crucial element in a smart soup? "A good
base made from scratch," says sous-chef Andrew Nordby. The
Heathman offers three soups a day; one is usually vegetarian.
Nordby echoes other chefs when he explains that soups are
made according to season and "whatever's in the walk-in."
The soups here change with the whims of the cooks who create
them; they're not hard-and-fast recipes. "The soup is going
to vary as much as the size of a chicken," says Nordby.
"You never make the same soup twice. The only one that really
stays stable is the bisque." Except, of course, the one
on the children's menu: Campbell's chicken noodle.
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Willamette Week | originally
published October 13,
1999
|
