I went out to lunch with some folks yesterday and mentioned the soup blog as we walked to the restaurant. It turned out we were all soup fans, and there was much discussion of what our favorites were, how they were made and what made them special. By the time we were seated we were holding forth with considerable fervor on the subject of food.
When our waitress showed up to run down the list of specials, she started off by saying, “…but I’m sure they can’t actually compete with what you were describing.” Actually, it came fairly close, but the lobster bisque did come off closer to a really rich mushroom soup than real seafood bisque. Tasty though.
By the way, lobster bisque will be the blogged soup the February 13th, the Sunday before Valentine’s Day. To me, it seems like the signature soup for cupid’s culinary compliment.
The question came up, directed at me, since I have a blog and thus know everything, or should, about the difference between two similar types of soup. I had to guess, and got it right…if backwards.
Q: What is the difference between a cream soup and a bisque?
A: It comes down to this:
- Cream soups use béchamel sauce (aka white sauce, aka butter, flour and cream) as a thickener
- Bisque basically uses cream and pureed vegetables as a thickener. Pureed potatoes or corn starch seem to fall within the acceptable bisque elements, but so far as I can tell it’s gluten free.
Seems backwards, doesn’t it?
When I make soups that call for cream, of either variety, I usually use fat free half and half, with excellent results, turning absolute decadence into mere rich indulgence.