Chantilly Soup

Ingredients

• 1 quart young green peas
• small bunch parsley
• 2 young onions
• 2 quarts medium stock (No. 105)

Method

Cook the peas, parsley, and onions together in salted water until the peas collapse easily under pressure — roughly 25–35 minutes depending on age and variety. You're aiming for complete softness; undercooked peas will not pass through the sieve cleanly and will leave grainy texture in the finished soup. The green colour will dull slightly as the chlorophyll breaks down, which is inevitable and correct.

Pass the cooked vegetables through a fine sieving|sieve while still hot, pushing them through with the back of a wooden spoon until only fibrous matter remains in the sieve. This vegetables|vegetable purée is your soup's body. Do not use a blender: the friction of the blades aerates the purée and creates a dull, greyish finish rather than the silken pale green you want.

Warm the stock separately — do not boil it hard. Pour it into the purée in stages, stirring constantly to build a uniform consistency. Stop when you reach the texture you prefer; Chantilly soup should coat the spoon but flow easily. Once the stock is incorporated, hold the soup below a rolling boil. Any aggressive heat after the peas are added will oxidise the chlorophyll and turn the colour muddy — this is a chemical change you cannot reverse. Keep it at a gentle simmer if you need to hold it; a simmer maintains temperature without the aggressive movement that damages colour.

Finish the soup hot and serve it immediately in warm bowls. The soup|soup is delicate: it will keep for a day but the colour fades with time and reheating. If you're serving for numbers, cook it in batches rather than holding a large pot on heat. Some kitchens finish Chantilly soup with a small pour of cream or a knob of butter whisked in at the table, but this is refinement, not requirement — the pea flavour is the point.