Sunchoke Bisque with Bread Salad

When I worked in Seattle we would frequently have sunchoke, or Jerusalem artichoke Bisque on our tasting menu. They are a tuber in the sunflower family which has a rich, velvety flavor, especially when paired with cream and stock. You can prepare them in many ways, but my experience they make a perfect soup.

One thing to note when using them, you want to blanch them off in water with lemon and celery to remove a carbohydrate some people can't process. Not everyone has this issue, but if you do, it will cause stomach discomfort and distress. It's recommended to do this to deactivate the enzyme, but there are other approaches. If you're fermenting them, or curing them in another manner, that step is also taken care of through that process.

For this soup, I actually had a hard time finding sunchokes. I had seen a fair amount at the Asian market I frequent, but when I went to purchase them, they were out. I kept looking for them for awhile with no luck. Eventually I went online and purchased some so I could make this soup. Additionally, I was able to plant a sunchoke plot to grow my own. I could have purchased them through one of our produce companies, but I generally prefer to keep my soup blog away from my work life. Because of this, I made a much smaller portion of soup than I traditionally do.

I decided to make a bread salad, or panzanella salad, to garnish this dish. There are number of ways to make this, but for me I went with a sourdough boule, fresh herbs, roasted shallots, and sunflower seeds. This added a pleasant texture and accentuated the flavor of the soup.

Though I made this soup with chicken stock, you can easily substitute that for a rich vegetable stock from the store. If you decide to go that route, I would adjust the seasonings and possibly add more onion and celery to the soup, depending on how strong the store bought stock you use is.

This soup is very simple to make, and honestly the rich, velvety flavor is an amazing touch to a refined meal. If you are looking for a soup to wow your friends as part of a meal, or just want to try something different, I highly recommend this soup.

Enjoy.

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Ingredients

Blanching Liquid

• lemons, zest and juice 1 ea

• celery, chopped 2 stalks

• water 2-3 qts

• sunchokes, peeled and chopped 1 lb

Soup

• white potatoes, peeled 2 ea

• blanched sunchokes 1 lb

• cream 12 oz

• chicken stock 1 qt

• avenue spice 1 T

• preserved lemons, minced 1 T

• thyme sprigs 3 ea

• sage, leaves 3 ea

• shallots, sliced 1 ea

• rice wine vinegar to taste

• salt to taste

• pepper to taste

• extra virgin olive oil 2 T

  
  

Garnish

panzanella, extra virgin olive oil, cracked black pepper

Method of Procedure

1. Start by putting you water, juiced and zested lemons, and celery into a pot and bring to a boil. Add your peeled sunchokes and cook for about 5 minutes until they begin to soften.

2. Remove the sunchokes discarding the blanching liquid and lemons, but reserving the celery and sunchokes.

3. Begin your soup by heating your pot then adding your olive oil.

4. Add all your ingredients except your vinegar, stock and liquid, and then cook while stirring to coat for about 5-10 minutes on medium heat.

5. Add your liquids and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for about 1 hour until everything has been cooked through.

6. Remove your thyme sprigs and sage leaves.

7. Blend your soup through a blender and run through a strainer to make sure there no clumps.

8. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and vinegar.

9. Place into a bowl and garnish with panzanella, extra virgin olive oil, and fresh cracked pepper.