Cook's Alphabet 'I'

Cook's Alphabet 'I'

This is the ninth in my series of 28 postings going through the entire alphabet, as it relates to cooks and cooking. As you can see, today I'm dealing with the letter 'I'.


The letter 'I' is, of course the eighth letter in the alphabet, and today's recipe is for a classic Iced soup which is an Edwardian classic:

Iced Tomato and Basil Soup

Ingredients
450g tomatoes, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 tsp tomato purée
1 tsp finely shredded fresh basil
600ml chicken stock
salt and black pepper
2 tbsp fresh soured cream to garnish (optional)

Method:
Add the tomatoes, onion, tomato purée and basil to a blender and render to a smooth purée. Pass through a sieve to remove any seeds and large pieces of tomato skin then stir-in the stock. Transfer to a saucepan and heat gently. Skim-off any froth as it rises to the surface and season to taste.

Take off the heat after about 10 minutes, allow to cool to room temperature then chill in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours. Serve in lightly-chilled soup bowls, garnished with a swirl of soured cream (if desired).

(This recipe reproduced, with permission, from the Celtnet Iced Tomato and Basil Soup Recipe page. )



Today's cooking term is Infuse: Infusion is the process of extracting the flavours from herbs, spices, teas or vegetables by adding boiling water or by gently heating in a liquid like milk, thus allowing the liquid to take-on the flavours of the substance added to it.


Today's spice is Indian Mustard: Indian Mustard This is brown mustard, Brassica juncea), originally from the foothills of the Himalaya and is an essential ingredient in many Indian recipes and has a higher level of volatile mustard oils that white mustard (and is thus stronger, but not as strong as black mustard)..


For more information on cookery-associated terms and information beginning with the letter 'I' here are various links that may well be of interest:

Recipes beginning with 'I'
Spices beginning with 'I'
Herbs beginning with 'I'
Wild foods beginning with 'I'
Cook's glossary 'I'