Making Soup

When people die, I need to make soup.

I don’t know why I’m drawn to making soup when I’m emotionally exhausted, but it seems to calm me. I’ve been making soup from total scratch for enough years now that it’s mostly second nature, and I think when one is dealing with loss, they crave a bit of familiarity. I know that when my dad died I couldn’t read any new books or watch any new TV shows for quite a while. I craved familiar stories, and I felt like I needed to make a lot of soup and bread.

An elderly great uncle of mine who was in a nursing home for the past few years passed away on December 31. We hadn’t been close for most of my life, but when he fell ill and was being treated at Royal University Hospital at the same time I was working on my master’s degree, I started going over every day to visit him. When he moved into Sherbrooke Community Centre, I maintained at least weekly visits.

He had been steadily declining in recent months, and his death was fairly expected and welcome, unlike that of my dad. However, death still carries the same finality, no matter who it is, or at what stage of their life or sickness they are at. It is a lot to process, logistically and emotionally.

My brain and body felt nearly void of energy after a very busy Christmas break drew to a close, and end of life logistics began. I finally dragged myself off the couch mid-afternoon on January 1, threw the Christmas ham bone and a few aromatics in my Instant Pot, and forced myself to walk to the grocery store.

At 7:30pm, about two hours later than usual, we had a scratch split pea soup on the table. I did not take a picture of it. Here instead is a picture of chicken noodle soup that I made a while ago.

This is how to make very flavourful stock from any animal bones you choose, plus aromatics. Homemade stock makes homemade soup a million times better. I prefer to use an Instant Pot, but you can also do it on the stove or even the slow cooker.

• Equivalent of at least one chicken carcass of bones (e.g. a pile of wing bones, pork rib bones, beef soup bones, a ham bone, etc. If it’s got some browning, even better. Meat and skin scraps are gold in here too)
• Half an onion                                                                             
• 2 cloves of garlic
• A leek top (optional but essential in my opinion)
• A few thyme sprigs (optional)
• 1 carrot
• 1 celery stalk
• About 10 peppercorns
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1 tbsp acidic substance, or a tomato (e.g. tomato paste, vinegar, lemon juice, apparently this helps to pull collagen out of the bones)

Toss everything in the Instant Pot, fill to max, and pressure cook for two hours. Allow to naturally release (will take up to two more hours, but I do not recommend quick release for this).

My favourite way to strain is to line a large metal sieve with cheesecloth, put it over a big bowl with pouring lips, and ladle stock and solids into the sieve. As the bowl fills, pour the strained stock into your containers of choice. I find that large yogurt containers and their equivalent are the perfect amount for creating a base for a soup for 2-3 people. I usually get 4 of these out of my 6 quart Instant Pot. After all the soup is strained you can just lift the cheesecloth and solids out of the sieve and discard for easy cleanup.

When I make beef stock, I put it in the fridge and let the fat solidify to discard it or save for later use. This is a personal preference because I find tallow has a very strong flavour that I don’t love. Pork and chicken fat melts better into the soup and is not noticeable, just delicious.