Chilled Beet and Cherry Soup Recipe

Chilly soups similar to borscht, gazpacho, and vichyssoise are amongst my favourite issues to eat through the hottest days of summer season, and now I am including this stunning chilled beet and cherry soup created by our take a look at kitchen colleague Nicole Hopper to my scorching climate checklist. The soup is made with recent beets and candy cherries—that are in season on the similar time throughout peak summer season—bitter cream or yogurt, star anise, and cinnamon. It’s kind of candy however leans extra to the savory aspect. You might eat it any time of day, however it could be significantly good served out of shot glasses as an amuse bouche for a summer season social gathering.

The cherry taste tempers the earthiness of the beets within the puréed soup, whereas entire cherries add a pop of sweetness for a taste trip one taster described as “tangy-tart-earthy-sweet.” In the meantime, the bitter cream (or yogurt) rounds out the flavors and provides further tang and a phenomenal richness. You possibly can prime the soup with a dollop of bitter cream or yogurt, or create a pretty drizzle by barely thinning the dairy with water. Learn on for recommendations on making the soup and to get Nicole’s full recipe.

4 Ideas for Making This Chilly Fruit Soup

1. Take into consideration investing in a cherry pitter. Whereas there are different methods to pit cherries—similar to pushing the pit out with a chopstick—when you plan to pit cherries (or olives) greater than a few instances a 12 months, it is price investing in a cherry/olive pitter.
2. Take into account carrying gloves. Beets stain every thing, together with palms and garments, so think about carrying latex gloves once you peel and chop the beets. Or just do as I do and wash your palms nicely after working with the beets. I additionally suggest utilizing a slicing board you do not care an excessive amount of about staining when working with beets and cherries. 
3. Mood the bitter cream. As famous above, when you simply add bitter cream on to the recent soup, the warmth may curdle the bitter cream. However by whisking among the scorching combination into the bitter cream first, you regularly increase the temperature of the bitter cream as an alternative of surprising it with warmth. 
4. Purée fastidiously. Watch out when transferring the combination from the stovetop to a blender and be sure you take away the highest plug on the blender to permit steam to flee. You too can use an immersion blender relatively than a standard blender, however the soup will not be fairly as silky-smooth.