Belgian chicory cream soup

Ingredients for 4 servings:

• 500 g chicory
• 3 m.-sized potatoes
• 1 m.-sized onion(s)
• 1 garlic clove(s)
• 1 tsp brown sugar
• 100 ml dry white wine
• 1.2 liters of chicken or vegetable broth
• 2 tbsp vegetable cream
• n. B. Salt and pepper, white
• 4 tbsp sweet cream or crème fraîche
• 6 tbsp diced ham
• e.g. chives

Instructions

Working time approx. 10 minutes; Cooking/baking time approx. 30 minutes; Total time approx. 40 minutes

Feathered velouté

Wash and trim the chicory, halve it, and slice it. If it’s too bitter for you, you can cut a wedge out of the bottom end. Set the strips of the tender upper leaf tips aside. Peel the potatoes and dice them. Peel the onion and garlic clove and finely dice them. Heat the vegetable cream in a soup pot and sauté the diced onion and garlic without browning. Then add the chicory and diced potatoes and sauté briefly. Stir in the sugar, let it caramelize slightly, and season with white pepper. Deglaze with the wine, sauté for 1 minute, and pour in the stock. Cover and simmer everything over low heat for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, lightly fry the ham cubes in a non-stick pan without fat. Then purée the soup, season with salt and pepper, and finish with the cream. Add the ham cubes, chicory strips, and chives to the soup when serving. Simply serve with a piece of bread. As a starter, the recipe also serves 6 people. If you want the soup to be vegetarian, use vegetable broth and omit the ham cubes.