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Kentucky Black Kettle Soup
Slowly boil a shin of veal in a gallon of water 4 hours, and keep skimming. Add 2 tablespoons rice and 2 cups each of corn, tomato pulp, diced potatoes, okra, and/or any other vegetable that's handy. Boil 1 hour more, then strain, return soup to kettle, thicken with brown flour, 4 tablespoons currant jelly, and 1 of Worcestershire. Boil a few more minutes and serve.
The old 3-legged black kettle might serve as a state symbol for Kentucky as well as any other southern state, and this soup, also, with variations. Northerners passing through the South for the first time are always struck by the gypsylike kettles and outdoor cooking. Wherever it's warm enough, kettle cooking out in the yard instead of in an oven-like kitchen is no novelty, but daily routine, so you'll find plenty of recipes in Southern cookbooks to take along and try out on picnics or in camp.
A long-simmered veal shank broth finished with browned flour and currant jelly, written for a kettle over a wood fire but entirely workable on a stove.
- Read the straining step carefullyAs written, straining after the vegetables have cooked would throw away the corn, okra and potatoes. Lift out the shin and bones, pull off the meat and return it with the vegetables to the pot; strain only if you want a clear soup, in which case add the vegetables after straining.
- Shin of vealA cross-cut veal shank, bone in, about 3 to 4 lb. Ask a butcher for osso buco cuts. Beef shank substitutes well but gives a darker, less gelatinous broth.
- Brown flourFlour dry-toasted in a skillet or a slow oven until the colour of cinnamon, with no fat added. It thickens less powerfully than raw flour, so allow 3 to 4 tablespoons whisked into a little cold water before it goes in, or it will lump.
- SkimmingThe skimming matters in the first 20 to 30 minutes, while the grey protein foam rises. After that the surface only needs occasional attention; keep the pot at a bare tremble rather than a rolling boil or the broth turns cloudy.
- Okra timingAn hour of boiling leaves okra collapsed and slippery. If you want it to hold its shape, add it in the last 15 minutes; if you want the soup thickened by it, leave it in for the full hour as written and go lighter on the flour.
- Tomato pulpTwo cups of skinned, seeded fresh tomato, or a 28 oz can of whole tomatoes crushed and drained of the thinnest juice. Canned tomatoes can taste sharper than fresh, so taste before adding much salt.
- The currant jellyFour tablespoons is a real sweet-sour seasoning, not a garnish. The recipe has it go in with the Worcestershire before a last few minutes of boiling; stir until dissolved, then taste. Red currant is tarter than most supermarket jellies, so start with half if you are using something sweeter.
- Water lossA gallon reduced over five hours of open-kettle cooking will fall well short of a gallon. Top up with hot water as you go if you want soup rather than a thick stew.
- YieldAbout 3 to 4 quarts finished, serving eight to ten as a main course. It improves overnight and the fat lifts off cleanly once chilled.