Simple Beet Borscht

Made with light-colored heirloom beets. For a super bright color, use classic red-purple beets. If you’re a beet lover, Eureka! Here’s a simple summer soup that’s beety, refreshing and pretty. If you’re not — and I’ve seen grown men cry over beets —this recipe is one of the easiest ways to introduce beets to the […]

Celebration Corn-Tomato Soup

Maybe I should have called this Last Chance Soup. I cooked it to celebrate the end of the corn season. Finally, we’re sick of corn on the cob. That’s the idea, right? Eat it until you’ve had enough, then wait till next year. I also made this to welcome Sanjaban and Cynthia’s visit a few […]

Phở

A bowl of Phở. Breathe in before you begin.. (Thursday nights in the winter at The Meat Market. Call first to confirm!) When I was young and living near Manhattan’s Chinatown, I fell in love with cheap Asian food, devouring pork buns on my way uptown to cook elegant lunches as an executive dining room […]

Surprise Red Pepper Soup

Soup with corn garnish variation. Picture of simplest version below. This intense soup combines the local harvest and eastern seasonings with a touch of butter to round them them all out. It’s terrific eaten immediately with crusty bread — I couldn’t help myself — but even better the next day. Triple the recipe to thaw […]

Tropical Butternut Bisque

On a snowy day, this soup reflects my locavore’s craving for the Caribbean — coconut with a touch of fiery ginger and cayenne pepper party with butternut’s sweet silky texture. The Berkshires produces fabulous butternut squash, and happily the local stuff is still around. Roasting it whole makes it effortless to peel. Use local onions […]

Two Kale Recipes for Fall

Garlicky Bean Soup with Kale I admire soup’s simple needs — a few ingredients, a little time and a bowl to contain it. But then I come from a family of soup lovers. My father says he’s never met a soup he doesn’t like. And my great grandmother, a Polish Jew, made such tasty soup […]