Issue #106: Spring Pea Soup

A Goal for the Planet, Advice from a Chef, A Fridge Full of Alliums, Recipe for Spring Pea Soup, Hot or Cold

Greetings everyone. Although I’ve only been home for a few days, I’ve managed to make the most of the greenmarket, which is in full bloom. After a spending two days at London’s beautiful OmVed Gardens, where the SDG2 Advocacy Hub hosted its annual Chefs’ Manifesto Action Hub, bringing chefs and other food professionals committed to sustainability together to share stories, talk about beans (#beansishow), and inspire each other, I returned to my local market with heightened sensitivity.

Just one of the dozens of platters of beautiful fresh vegetables we were served at OmVed Gardens during the Chefs’ Manifesto Action Hub.

At OmVed our lunches were prepared by a team of cooks under the direction of chef Arthur Potts Dawson. Each day they laid out a vegetarian buffet of such variety, abundance, and sheer beauty that it literally brought tears to my eyes. Oversized platters and bowls of fresh vegetables and salads in vibrant dressings were strewn with fresh herbs and flowers from the garden. As I listened to all the ways attendees were working hard to introduce sustainable, plant-forward practices into their work, I thought, we could sum up what we are trying to do as making this sort of abundant, fresh, seasonal food affordable, accessible, and available to everyone. Were we to achieve such a goal, it would undeniably improve the health of our people and our planet. We have our work cut out for us.

While contemplating how we might achieve that goal, have a listen to this week’s What’s Burning podcast, for which I interview my old friend and colleague Elizabeth Blau, a visionary restaurant consultant based in Las Vegas, who in addition to creating some of the most beloved restaurants, has also created an impactful program to support women’s leadership in the hospitality industry.

“Noli took a second helping,” I heard from the dining room, as I washed some dishes in the kitchen. Noli, short for Magnolia, is a finicky teenager, whose mother has been encouraging her to try new things.

“Can I have some more crème fraiche?”­­­

“I’m having seconds, too,” added Nate.

This exchange happened Monday night, after I tested the simple recipe below for pea soup and served it as a starter for a weekday dinner for friends. I was inspired to create the recipe after harvesting a bagful of pea shoots grown in a pot on our terrace and finding piles of beautiful shell peas at the greenmarket earlier that day. I wanted to cook something that highlighted the delicious spring flavor of fresh peas.

English shelling peas this morning in the Union Square Greenmarket.

Before I put pot to stove, I remembered something the great chef and dear friend Andrew Carmellini once told me decades prior. When Andrew was executive chef of Café Boulud, he became known for several signature dishes, including impossibly delicate gnocchi and a chilled pea soup that made a seasonal appearance on the restaurant’s “Le Potager” menu. I recall one year at Chefs & Champagne—an elegant annual lawn party the James Beard Foundation threw in the Hamptons for almost 30 years—Andrew, with the help of his wife Gwen, one of my oldest friends from high school, served his chilled pea soup out of large silver urns to more than 300 people. He told me back then that the secret to maximizing the flavor of fresh peas was to use an equal amount of frozen peas.

I harvested this bag of pea shoots from our terrace.

Often overlooked by locavore militants, the grocery store freezer section can be a source of very respectable fruits and vegetables. Picked in their prime, quickly blanched, and frozen to preserve their peak flavor, sometimes right there in the field, frozen vegetables, such as peas, are an excellent substitute, or in this case, a complement to fresh. From both a nutritional and a sustainability standpoint, some experts believe frozen vegetables can even be better than fresh. I always have green peas in my freezer because I regularly make fried rice and I consider peas an essential ingredient in it.

So, Monday I set out to make a quick pea soup from fresh peas, bolstered by some frozen peas, and with just a few other ingredients I had on hand. It’s spring, so I have a fridge full of alliums, including large bulbous onions and green garlic. I also had some beautiful fresh spinach, some of which I decided to add to enhance the color and flavor of the soup. I used a combination of vegetable stock and dashi for the liquid. Dashi gives a welcome boost of umami, which I think is important to enhance the natural flavor of vegetables. When I don’t have dashi, I add umami in other ways, with kelp stock (see Issue #91), some light soy sauce, or white miso, my favorite variety of which is the delicate saikyo miso from Kyoto. After a quick simmer, I puréed the whole thing with some fresh mint, and that’s it. Delicious.  

The simmered pea soup is ready for the blender. (Don’t forget to remove the bay leaf first!)

I served the soup warm, garnished with those fresh pea tendrils, a dollop of crème fraiche, and some chive blossoms. (I told you my fridge is full of spring alliums.) You could also serve it chilled, though you’d need to adjust the seasoning, adding more mint so the flavor pops. The welcome taste of spring.

RECIPE: Spring Pea Soup

(Makes 6 to 8 servings)

• 2 tablespoons olive oil

• 1 large, bulbous spring onion, with some of the green tops, or ½ large yellow cooking onion, finely chopped

• 2 cups (about 10 ounces) fresh shell peas

• 2 cups (about 10 ounces) frozen petite peas

• 6 cups vegetable or chicken stock, dashi, kombu stock, or a combination

• ¼ pound fresh spinach leaves and stems

• 1 bay leaf

• 1 teaspoon sea salt

• Freshly ground black pepper

• 1 tablespoon white miso, preferably saikyo miso

• 5 or 6 leaves fresh mint

To garnish

• Fresh pea tendrils, crème fraiche, yogurt or sour cream, chive blossoms or other fresh herbs, edible flowers, or what have you.

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the chopped onion and sauté until soft and translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the fresh and frozen peas, stock, spinach, bay leaf, salt, and a few grinds of black papper and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to very low, cover, and simmer for about 20 minutes, until the fresh peas are soft.

I love my Vitamix blender, especially for making light, puréed soups such as this one. An immersion blender will also work.

Fish out the bay leaf and discard. Transfer the soup to a large blender. (You may need to work in batches.) Add the miso and fresh mint and purée to form a perfectly smooth soup. Alternately, you can use an immersion blender. If planning to serve warm, return to the pot and reheat to serve. Garnish with fresh pea tendrils, fresh herbs, a dollop of yogurt, or however you like it. The soup can also be served chilled (in which case you may want to add more mint). Chill for at least four hours and serve in chilled bowls or cups.

I garnished the bowls with pea shoots, crème fraîche, and chive blossoms.

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