Wow! That's an awesome sounding name, isn't it? Before today I'd never met a watercress in person so this was a pretty momentous occasion. Have you had watercress before? If not, I'll let you know it looks like small spinach leaves and has a bit of a peppery taste. Used in this soup, however, it didn't carry through a super strong flavor -- its a nice mellow soup that makes a great side appetizer or side dish. Sorry I didn't take a photo, I was having way too much fun cooking and forgot about it. I'm pretty sure Google will have one if you'd like to see what it looks like.
I didn't have any big crisis preparing this, which is a bit unique by itself. This was quite the French cooking day though. I didn't need to leave the house for meetings today and had some time free in the morning so I started the day by making Eggs Benedict just because that's what I felt like having for breakfast. I really like Julia's hollandaise sauce recipe - I made it again and it turned out perfect! Unlike the previous methods I'd used before meeting Julia, this one has ended up creamy and tasty every time and never had the eggs and butter separate. I'm sure it will some day but I'm on a roll! No photos of breakfast - I just made it for fun and a tasty breakfast this time.
Breakfast warmed me up to get the soup,errrrr -- potage, going. Potage au Cresson started out with the same basic potato and leek soup recipe with the watercress just being added about five minutes before blending everything together. We were having a family dinner today so that meant doubling the recipe which meant doubling the amount of potatoes to peel. Thanks to my beautiful sous chef, Elizabeth, I had the potatoes peeled pretty quickly. Then my knife skills were put to use dicing all of the potatoes and into the pot of water they went.
I used some of the biggest leeks I've ever seen this time -- I didn't think to take a picture but these babies were monsters!! They were huge! They looked like they came out of Jurasic Park. As a matter of fact, they were sooooooo big I ended up using only 2/3 of them. They were washed and then sliced and tossed in the pot with the potatoes. A half pound of watercress went in with everything about 50 minutes later and then everything was blended using the immersion blender. I love using that thing! I think that's part of the reason I'm making all these soups lately, just so I can use the thing! Power tools and cooking - the perfect pairing!
After everything was blended together and transformed into a nice creamy consistency, guess what I got to add? Nope, not butter this time. This time it was butter's close cooking cousin -- cream! Cream was slowly stirred in and it was done. A small handful of watercress had been kept out when the rest went in with the potatoes and leeks. The handful was quickly blanched in boiling water for just 30 seconds and then cooled off with cold water and then used as a garnish on the soup when dished out.
Yep, no injuries and done on time, and it tasted pretty good. Hard to believe this is a French recipe since it uses no butter! In any case, I think I'm getting the hang of this type of soup. I'm still not going to try making strained fish soup though...
Bon Appetit!
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