Soups

Every day at The Smile we put together two different soup specials, one for the lunch crowd and one for dinner. “Soup of the Day” is an age-old restaurant trick that everyone uses to get rid of produce that’s on its way out, or to give a second life to leftover ingredients. Despite those humble origins, our soups have often been among my favorite dishes on the menu. There’s something to be said for a total lack of premeditation and a casual throw-it-in-the-pot attitude.

I find that great recipes can be born out of intuitively combining ingredients that you happen to have on hand—wouldn’t a roasted pear go nicely in this butternut squash soup? Why don’t we sauté some fennel in there and see how it tastes? When it comes to soup, I like a bold, uncomplicated flavor that will be instantly satisfying from the first spoonful. As often as possible, I try to make the soup of the day vegetarian-friendly (or even vegan-friendly, since we’re already halfway there). Yes, there are many great soups that cannot do without the rich, meaty flavor of homemade beef broth or chicken stock, but in this chapter I’ve focused on vegetarian soups with pure, straightforward ingredients. I start with the extremely simple formula of melted onions, a vegetable, water, and salt. From there I tweak by adding complementary flavors—an aromatic bay leaf to give subtlety to a combination of potato and leeks, a squeeze of lime to cut the sweetness of the butternut, a few carrots to bulk up the tomatoes.