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Tomato Soup with Stock
1 chopped onion 2 whole cloves 1/2 teaspoon celery seed 6 each peppercorns and tomatoes, or 1 qt. canned tomatoes 1 tablespoon flour 1 tablespoon shortening Take bones and trimmings from roast beef or steak. Cover with cold water, twice as much as the meat, add seasonings and cook slowly 2 1/2 hours. Skim off fat, add tomatoes (cook 1/2 hour if fresh tomatoes are used). Skim out bones and meat, and strain liquor through a puree strainer, rubbing all the pulp through. Heat, thicken with flour cooked with the shortening. Serves 8.
A thrifty stock-based tomato soup that assumes you have the bones from Sunday's roast on hand. The written quantities cover only the aromatics and the thickening; the meat is left to whatever you happen to have.
- How much meat and boneNo weight is given. Something in the region of two to three pounds of beef bones with some meat and trimmings still attached would suit eight servings; the recipe simply says to cover with twice as much cold water as meat, without saying whether by weight or volume.
- Reading the ingredient line"6 each peppercorns and tomatoes" means six peppercorns and six fresh tomatoes, or one quart of canned tomatoes in place of the fresh.
- Puree strainerThis is a conical sieve or food mill. A fine mesh strainer with a ladle to press the pulp through works, as does a food mill with the medium plate; a blender changes the texture and leaves the seeds and skins in.
- SaltNo salt is specified by name, though the instruction to 'add seasonings' may be meant to cover it. Salt the strained liquid before thickening and taste again at the end.
- Skimming the fatSkimming while hot removes only part of it. If you have the time, chill the strained stock and lift the solidified fat off in a sheet, then proceed.
- The thickeningCook the tablespoon of flour in the tablespoon of shortening until it smells nutty but stays pale, then whisk in a ladle of the hot soup before returning it to the pot. A single tablespoon of flour across a potful of this size gives body, not a thick soup.
- Acid and dairyThere is no milk here, so the tomato acid poses no curdling problem. If you add cream at the table, temper it with hot soup off the heat rather than pouring it into the boiling pot.
- YieldEight servings as written.