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Cottage Cheese Soup
1/4 cup shortening 2 tablespoons cornstarch 4 cups milk 1 teaspoon salt Paprika parsley 2 cups cottage cheese Melt the shortening, remove from fire and add cornstarch. Stir the mixture until it is smooth, add the milk and return it to the fire. Cook 3 or 4 minutes, stirring constantly. Add the seasoning and the cottage cheese; beat vigorously a minute and serve hot. Serves 8.
A cornstarch-thickened milk soup finished with fresh cheese, built to be bland, warm and high in protein. It comes together in under fifteen minutes, and nearly everything that can go wrong goes wrong in the last minute.
- Do not boil after the cheese goes inCottage cheese curd is acid-set and will tighten and go grainy if the soup returns to a simmer. Take the pan off the heat, then beat the cheese in; the residual heat is enough to warm it through.
- Smooth cheese, smooth soupBeating vigorously by hand leaves visible curd in the finished soup. For a smooth soup, press the cottage cheese through a sieve or give it a few seconds with an immersion blender before adding.
- ShorteningIn a book of this vintage "shortening" means a solid vegetable fat or lard. Butter is the better choice here and adds the flavour the recipe otherwise lacks; 1/4 cup is 4 tablespoons.
- The cornstarch off the heatStirring cornstarch into melted fat away from the flame prevents lumps. It does not need the long cooking-out a flour roux does, but it must still be brought up to a bare simmer to thicken. Add the milk while the mixture is still warm and whisk as it comes back to temperature.
- Thickening and timingTwo tablespoons cornstarch to four cups milk gives a thin, pourable soup. It thickens as it reaches a bare simmer; the stated 3 or 4 minutes is ample, and prolonged hard boiling with constant stirring can thin a cornstarch-thickened soup again.
- SeasoningOne teaspoon salt for four cups of milk plus two cups cheese is modest, and salted cottage cheese varies widely. Taste at the end. Paprika and parsley are given without quantity: a light dusting of paprika and a little chopped parsley over each serving is in keeping.
- YieldEight servings works out to about three-quarters of a cup each from roughly six cups of milk and cheese. As a first course for a normal meal it serves four to five.