Recipe: New Potato and Swiss Chard Soup With Gochujang
The weather has been so wet and chilly lately that making soup feels appealing even in mid July.
The casually gorgeous piles of multicolored Swiss chard at Indian Line Farm’s stall called out to me this past weekend. And the freshly dug Yukon Gold potatoes at the next stall had something to say as well. They communicated soup.
With any soup, you want to start with a great stock or broth, be it vegetable, chicken, beef or fish. In this case I tapped into my cache of frozen roasted chicken jus from my last herb roasted chicken in the spring, thinned down with a little filtered water. Gochujang (a dense Korean condiment made by fermenting red chili, glutinous rice and soybeans) looks like it would be fiercely spicy given the deep red color, but in the right dose it is about so much more than heat — it lends a sweet, complex deeply fermented umami flavor to these seasonal ingredients so that with a slice of country bread you have a meal.
New Potato and Swiss Chard Soup with Gochujang
Serves 4
2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 small yellow onion, minced
4 small to medium Yukon gold potatoes, scrubbed but not peeled
1 ½ quarts broth or stock of your choice
Pinch of sea salt
1 Tablespoon pastured butter
1 head Swiss chard of any color
Pinch of sea salt
4 teaspoons Gochujang — one for each serving to be mixed in just before serving
Using a heavy bottomed pot, place over medium heat and add the olive oil. Once the oil is shimmering a little, add the onion and garlic and stir vigorously, lower the heat and cook while stirring until the onions are translucent.
Add the potatoes, the stock and a pinch of salt and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook until the potatoes are quite tender, about 15 minutes.
Strip the leafy parts of the chard away from the stems and cut the leaves into ½-inch thick ribbons. Separately mince the stems. Heat a sauté pan or skillet over medium high heat. Add the butter and once it is sizzling a little add the stems. Give the stems a one-minute head start before adding the leaves. Stir constantly until the chard is nicely wilted but still vibrantly colored. Season with a pinch of sea salt.
Ladle the potatoes and broth into each bowl, divide up the sautéed chard and pass around the Gochujang.
