I love topinambour, for their quirky shapes as well as their earthy smell and somewhat different, slightly sweet taste. Delicious are they in a cocotte or pureed as a side dish and just as wonderful are they as a soup. Unlike a chunky vegetable soup or earthy legume soup, we rarely have only a creamy soup for dinner. I don’t find it substantial enough, unless you eat a huge bowl or two, which makes it too rich. So I’ll normally serve this soup as a starter and then follow up with something like maybe a warm salad or chicken filet with a tomato sauce.
See also Zlamushcka’s version of a topinambour soup.
Velouté de topinambours(Jerusalem artichokes)
- About 400 g topinambours
- 3 shallots
- 1 large sweet potato
- 750 ml organic vegetable stock(or chicken stock)
- 1 bouquet garni(parsley stems, thyme, bay leaves & lemon peel wrapped and tied in the green part of a leek)
- olive oil
- salt and pepper to taste
- cream to add to taste(milk for a lighter version)
- a drop or two of freshly squeezed lemon juice
- Peel the topinambours and the sweet potato and cut into slices.
- Peel, chop the shallots and sauté in some olive oil until translucent.
- Add the sliced the stweet potato, topinambours, the stock, the bouquet garni and let it simmer for at least 30 minutes or longer. The topinambours needs to be well cooked and very tender.
- Take off the heat, remove the bouquet garni and mix until smooth and velvety, adding milk or cream to your preferred consistency.
- Heat up gently, add some lemon juice and salt and papper to taste.
- Serve in warmed bowls and finish off with a drizzle of fruity extra virgin olive oil and a a turn of the pepper mill.
- Serve warm with toasted bread triangles or a grainy baguette.
Serves 4 – 6
This is an entry for WHB nr 111, hosted by Kalyn at Kalyn’s kitchen. For more info on weekend herb blogging read here.
Myfrenchkitchen 
