Dandelion Flower Soup

Dandelion sweep! A recipe by Oskar Marti, a Swiss chef who likes to cook a lot with wild herbs and documents this very nicely in four seasonal books. Unfortunately, two of them are already out of print….

I make a vegetable stock from

• asparagus peels
• 1/2 leek (the green)
• 2 stalks of celery
• 1 carrot
• 1 clove of garlic
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 teaspoon of peppercorns

the vegetables boil easily for an hour, then they go away and I measure 400 ml of stock for the soup. There come in

• about 10 dandelion flowers
• 1/2 teaspoon piment d’Espelette
• 1 pinch of vanilla

I boil the soup again and let it steep for 10 minutes. Then I remove the flowers and add

• 70 ml port wine
• 1 tablespoon dandelion flower jelly

to it. When the soup boils again, I add a good 1 tbsp of flour butter. I quickly kneaded this together from

• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 tablespoon flour

Always stir well, the soup binds now already slightly. Now I add this mixture:

• 70 ml whipped cream
• 2 egg yolks

Heat again until the soup thickens. Pour into the preheated plates and sprinkle some dandelion petals on top. The dandelion adds a slight bitter note to the soup, but otherwise the port is readily apparent. A good menu soup, better served in cups.

cream soup with dandelion flower petals