When Michelle and I ate our first bowls of wild mushroom barley soup, we altered the recipe slightly by skipping the milk the recipe called for until we sat down to eat. Then, we added a bit of milk to our bowls to cool the soup.
This brought back memories for me. When my brother and I were children, we ate a lot of soup, often accompanied by a glass of milk. Served properly, the soup was too hot for our tastes, so our mother allowed us to cool it by pouring some of our milk into the bowl. Campbell’s soup, in my memory, is hardly complete without a dollop of milk.
I remember, though, that we didn’t always drink milk at lunch. One day, we drank Koolaid. Lime Koolaid. Our chicken noodle soup was too hot, and needed to be cooled.
I don’t remember for sure who’s idea it was to follow our usual custom of cooling the soup with our drink. Nor do I recall for sure who stepped first into the breach. However, I know a few things:
- I was the younger brother.
- I was not, generally speaking, the “idea man” of the pair.
- When faced with reluctance or doubt, my brother often took the initiative.
- My brother also had a habit of pouring a lot of milk into his soup to cool it.
- I can distinctly recall, without a moment’s hesitation, the taste of chicken noodle soup cooled by lime Koolaid.
Feel free to draw your own conclusions . . . .