Beer cheese soup
- 10 hours ago
- 5 min read
"two ingredients that don’t immediately scream soup to much of the world" Felicity Cloake
Beer and cheese however, are perfectly common and indeed a winning combination. Well I imagine to the experts you have to have the right cheese with the right beer, but to those with no savvy palate like me, most beers and most cheeses are a perfect match. And in Winconsin - famous for its beer, and for its cheese - it's apparently the dairy king of America - they have used their prime ingredients to make this hearty soup. Well I'm guessing it gets pretty cold in Wisconsin in the winter, facing as it does on to two of the great lakes that form the border with Canada, and this is decidedly a warming substantial kind of soup.
Why am I writing about beer cheese soup? Well my latest resolve is to go through my very long list of Ideas and at least get rid of all of those that are just recipe titles - and this is the next one going backwards - inspired by Felicity Cloake's Perfect beer and cheese soup - I think I probably thought that it was a poor man's kind of French onion soup, although why I should have I really don't know as the only common factor is the cheese. There is no beer, let alone wine, and lots of onions. It also reminded me of the good old British Ploughman's lunch which is almost always accompanied by beer and always has some kind of cheese attached.
I suppose welsh rarebit would enter as a variation as well. I came across more than one reference to Welsh rarebit in my wanderings today.
But no this is definitely a Wisconsin thing. In fact it was interesting how very few recipes for such a thing existed outside America. So perhaps I should mention the non-Americans first. From the UK - Debbie Major on the UK delicious. website with her Cheddar and ale soup - and Tom Kerridge - a highly regarded British chef with his identically named Cheddar and ale soup but much cheffier with a garnish topping of a malty dressing and chopped apple and chives. On the whole though the Brits seem to keep the beer and cheese combination for Welsh rarebit
What about the Australians? Again - just two - Cheesy brew soup with bacon strudel - Spencer Watts/SBS which is worth looking at if only for the bacon strudel which I'm going to use as a pre-dinner snack for my family some time soon I think and Roast garlic, cheddar and ale soup with fried cauliflower - Emma Knowles?/Gourmet Traveller, which is possibly just a bit too distant from Wisconsin - a whole head of garlic is involved - plus that cauliflower.
The Irish, however, seem to have taken it to their hearts although maybe it was the Irish who took it to America - a thought I had when I saw this Best Irish beer cheese soup on the A Saucy Perspective website, and glancingly noticed similar Irish versions. You see in America this soup is often served like this - poured into a hollowed out loaf - or roll, for which Felicity Cloake rightly points out:
"Individual crusty rolls mean you don’t have to all hunch around one large boule clashing spoons"
Which I hadn't thought of, but I have to say it has never appealed as a way to serve soup - what a waste of the bread you have hollowed out - even if you do use it as breadcrumbs or some such. And would the soggy bread at the edge of the soup add to the experience or make it yucky. Probably the former - after all there are hundreds and hundreds of soups that incorporate bread into their deliciousness somehow.
Nobody mentioned that this particular dish came from the Irish originally however. Germany and neighbouring countries was sometimes mentioned because they do have beer soups and cheese soups - but Felicity Cloake did not find a beer cheese soup. And there are plenty of people descended from Germans in Wisconsin. The next door state of Minnesota also seems to have a stake in its popularity. So what is Beer cheese soup?
Hard to say I think, having now looked at several different recipes. None of them are the same. This is truly a home soup. One that is made according to the cook's choices and probably what she - I bet it's almost always a she - has in the fridge and the cupboard.
There are, of course, two or three constants, which I guess make up the essential spirit of the dish, but there seems to be an enormous amout of leeway as to the rest.
The constants? Well that beer of course - a Wisconsin Pabst Blue Ribbon, but a lager or Pilsner seems to be the best substitute says Felicity Cloake:
"My testers have a strong preference for mellower, American-style lagers here, as opposed to richer, hoppier blondes and pale ales, which can become bitter and cloying when heated."
Well at least she tested a lot of different beers - although nobody went for stout of course.
Extra liquid was mostly stock and mostly chicken stock, although there was also cream or milk - the most contentious ingredients perhaps.
The cheese - well American cheese is not British cheese - well anybody else's cheese. But I got the impression that most leant towards a cheddar kind of thing and some went for a mix which might include a smoked cheddar or a blue cheese. The Americans often - but not always - also at least decorated the soup with bacon - or smoked barbecued bratwurst - which as Felicity says: "feels very American (if in doubt, add bacon)" . Some said that the traditional topping was popcorn, although I can't say I saw it on a lot of soups.
As for the rest - it was almost anything goes - certainly as far as vegetables are concerned - although some kind of allium was pretty much constant. I suspect depending on where you lived in America you might get Jalapeños or other chillies as well. Felicity and her testers liked carrots for the sweetness to balance the bitterness of the beer and Honest Cooking & Travel topped theirs with caramelised parsnip and swede - which seemed to be pretty unique.
Extra flavour was derived from various herbs - mostly thyme Felicity went for caraway seeds and paprika - Worcestershire sauce and mustard - mostly Dijon but not always - another reminder of Welsh rarebit. And almost everyone blended the soup although somebody pointed out that it was best to add the cheese after the blending because the cheese got stuck on the blender. But you don't have to aspire to complete smoothness because - Felicity Cloake again - "I’m not sure elegance is what this dish aspires to."
Enough. Here are four American examples from here and there - mostly 'ordinary' cooks.
Beer and cheddar soup - Jonathan Erdeljac/Food and Wine; Beer cheese soup - The Cozy Cook; Wisconsin native's beer cheese soup - Savvy Hostess/Allrecipes; Wisconsin beer cheese soup - Honest Cooking & Travel - the one with the parsnips and swedes.
I guess it's yet another dish that demonstrates that this country of immigrants has developed a unique cuisine which may have roots plucked from the homelands of its immigrants, but which have mostly originated in the kitchens of those migrants according to what they could afford, what their particular environment provided and was suited to, and what they liked to eat.
It's almost the end of winter here, but not quite. This might be something to curl up with on one of those cold nights.
YEARS GONE BY
August 29
2023 - A guru in retro fancy mode
2021 - Missing
2020 - Missing
2019 - Luxury escaping
2017 - Chips (not crisps)
2016 - Burnt offerings
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