It’s Seriously Soupy Sunday, featuring one of my favorite bloggers Serena, who authors a blog called Seriously Soupy. Serena started Seriously Soupy as a creative outlet for herself after her first daughter was born, which combined her passion for cooking with an interest in learning more about soups and soup making. Since it started she has given soup tours and taught soup classes and has a catalogue of over 100 soups on the site! You can join Serena on her Soupy journey at SeriouslySoupy.com and twice a month you can find her here, at My Judy the Foodie, sharing her wisdom and helping demystify the world of soup.
The beauty of soups (and there are so many beautiful things) is that no two recipes ever have to be the same – despite using similar ingredients. Your lentil soup can be a veggie-based soup and mine might have pork. Or maybe, you use red lentils and I use brown. The basic components and idea of these soups are the same, but its taste can be very different, depending on your ingredients – making mom’s chicken soup very different than what you buy in a store. What is so great about this (and rather amazing) is that the possibilities really are endless with soup making.
I was recently inspired to create a soup that would use the same base ingredient (cantaloupe) by making three soup variations out of it. For this soup recipe entitled, “One Cantaloupe, Three Soups,” I made a prosciutto and melon mint soup, a green tea-infused melon soup and triple basil melon soup. Asking me to pick my favorite would be difficult, so I’ll just say that they all had very distinctive flavors with strong hints of the sweet and yummy muskmelon. The prosciutto melon was smoky and packed a punch thanks to the mint; the green tea one was a bit “earthy” but blended well with the apricot and the triple basil melon was like a light and refreshing smoothie-like soup with a peppery finish. After this experiment, I’ll never look at one ingredient the same way and (another beautiful thing about soups) is that you never have to.
Soupy Side Note: Since I only used one cantaloupe to create these soups, the recipe requires ¼ a chunk of cantaloupe, which made one serving. If you would like more servings, I would use one whole cantaloupe per soup and double up on the ingredients. But remember: there are no rules in soup making, so let your judgment and taste testing be your guide.
Prosciutto and Melon Mint Soup
Soup #1 Prosciutto and Melon Mint Soup
Ingredients:
- ¼ cup of cantaloupe, cubed
- ½ cup of water
- ¼ cup of Greek yogurt such a FAGE
- 2-3 sprigs of fresh mint
- 1 package of prosciutto
Instructions:
- Boil the water in a bowl and add the mint and lime.
- Cut the cantaloupe, along with the prosciutto and add them to the pot. Let cook for 5-10 minutes.
- Turn off the flame and add the mixture to a blender. Let chill for 2-3 hours and serve cold.
Green Tea-Infused Melon Soup topped with Dried Apricot
Soup #2 Green Tea-Infused Melon Soup
Ingredients:
- ¼ cup of cantaloupe, cubed
- 3-5 bags of green tea
- 1 tablespoon of honey or agave nectar
- 1 tablespoon of lemon
- 3-5 dried apricots
- Pinch of ginger or fresh ginger
- 2 cups of water
Instructions:
- Boil water. Place tea bags in the water and let seep, along with ginger, lemons and honey for 10 minutes.
- Add the cantaloupe and apricots to soften. When cool (about 30 minutes), remove the tea bags and take out the apricots and cut lengthwise.
- Place in the blender, along with the rest of the contents. Let chill for 2-3 hours and serve cold.
Triple Melon Basil Soup topped with Red Basil
Soup #3 Triple Melon Basil Soup
Ingredients:
- ¼ cup of cantaloupe, cubed
- ¼ cup of honeydew, cubed
- ¼ cup of watermelon, cubed
- Pinch of ginger
- Splash of lime
- ½ cup of water
- 2-3 sprigs of fresh basil
- Garnish: red basil
Instructions:
- Boil water on a low heat. Cut up the melons and add them to the pot, along with ginger, lime and basil (you can also add honey or lemons, if you wish).
- Let cook for 5 minutes – stirring periodically. Blend it together and top with red basil.
- Can be eaten immediately or chill for 2-3 hours.
How creative! We are suckers for chilled soups when the temperature soars. Thanks for sharing your creations!
Amy
Chobani
Fabulously creative!! 😀
These are fantastic! This is my first time here but I will definitely check out Seriously Soupy we are BIG on soups at our house.