We had ourselves a little Soup Swap here on Sunday afternoon. Actually, it wasn't so little and if you want to get all technical, it wasn't literally a swap. But it was a ton of fun and every person that arrived bearing three quarts of homemade soup went home with three different homemade soups. When I first sent the email out asking if anyone was game to come on over and swap some soup, I was hoping that maybe five or six soup-loving souls would say yes. We ended up having fifteen different soups -- there were 45 quarts of soup on our funny old table! Some in Zip-loc bags, others in jars, some in carboard containers and other in plastic tubs. Some came with garnishes such as chopped hard boiled egg, tortilla strips, cheese and cilantro, parmesan and even lovely green apples. Some were chunky, others were silky and they ranged from Polish Pickle Soup to New Year's Hot & Sour.
And the soup makers were a great mashup of family, friends, neighbors, former colleagues (and a lot of those categories tend to blend and bleed into each other) hanging out while the kids tore around the basement wearing capes, crowns and masks. This was my first time hosting any sort of a swap and it was a breeze to organize and a lot of fun to host. The website SoupSwap (yes, such a thing exists) provided me with guidelines -- for example, for the first round of "swapping" we used the number-in-the-hat method that is suggested. But for the second and third rounds we got a little more creative, using birthdays (going backwards) and first initials of people's names. Also, I didn't go with the suggestion to have people bring six quarts of soup. That just struck me as way too much to make and take home. (I know I don't have room in my freezer for six quarts of anything!) So I halved it and went with the odd but lovely number of three. Nobody seemed to balk at that quantity.
I don't know for certain but it seemed like everyone went home happy and genuinely looking forward to trying their soup. I know I am. I was lucky enough to get Fran's Cream of Spinach Soup soup, (a gorgeous, grassy green, we're having for supper tonight) Teresa's Split Pea "Zupka" and the Kuzma's Chicken & Sweet Potato Stew. Oh and I made Creamy Artichoke soup. And it wasn't khaki-colored and it tasted like artichokes!
Now I am wondering what sort of food swap is up next . . . maybe a Bread Swap? Or perhaps a Pickle Swap? I'll keep you posted.
Comments