Traditional Western soup recipes
In the West, soup is distinguished from stock, which is an ingredient of soup, but is not itself a complete dish, and stew, which contains more solids than soup, although this distinction is not always clear-cut. There are several main families of soup in traditional cuisine: broth or bouillon is the uncleared liquid in which meat has been boiled, consommé is a forcemeat broth cleared with egg white, thickened soup is a soup that contains bread, grain, flour, blood or other thickening agents, puréed soup is a soup in which the ingredients are blended or strained through a sieve, and a cream soup is a soup is a smoothly strained soup to which cream is added. A bisque is a kind of puréed soup that is generally made with seared crustaceans. Court bouillon is a special kind of bouillon containing white wine, vinegar or lemon juice in which other ingredients are poached.
Typical soup ingredients include legumes, such as peas and lentils, all kinds of vegetables, noodles, dumplings, meat, bread, grains and royale. Generally, all larger ingredients are diced or chopped, so that they can be eaten with a spoon. Meat is sometimes added as forcemeat balls. Fresh herbs and croutons are used to garnish soup.
Cold soups
Soups which are designed to be served cold include several variations on tomato soup, the potato-based American vichyssoise, borscht, cucumber soup and fruit soups. Cold soups can be salty when made from vegetables, or sweet, when made from fruits. Cold soups are frequently served in hot seasons instead of hot soups. Clear consommé sets into a gel when chilled, and may be broken up and served in a soup dish; a version with tomato-flavored beef stock is the madrilene that was adopted for French cuisine from Spain. Another well-known cold Spanish soup is the Andalucian soup, gazpacho. Gazpacho is made by blending chunks of tomato and other vegetables with lemon juice, balsamic vinegar and olive oil.
Cream soups
Cream soups are made with milk, cream or sour cream. Typically all ingredients are blended smooth or creamed. Cream vegetable or mushroom soups are often used as liquids or sauces in other dishes. This may be the most common use of cream of mushroom soup. Similar soups may be made with melted cheese as in beer cheese soup.
