Veloute de Champignons, French Cream of Mushroom Soup
A veloute is a French soup blended to the texture its name promises, velvet, and it usually gets there on a roux of butter and flour finished with cream. This version reaches the same smoothness with none of that. Dry-seared cremini build the savory base, a small handful of dried porcini deepen it past what fresh mushrooms manage on their own, and blended oat cream carries the richness at the end. There is no oil, no flour, and no dairy anywhere in the pot. A last spoon of sherry vinegar does the brightening a French cook would otherwise reach for salt to do.
Ingredients
- 1 lb Cremini mushrooms, sliced
- 1/2 oz Dried porcini
- 2 wholes Shallots, minced
- 3 cloves Garlic, minced
- 4 sprigs Thyme
- 1/2 cup Oat cream
- 1 tbsp no-salt vegetable bouillon
- 2 tsp Sherry vinegar
- 1/8 tsp Nutmeg, freshly grated
- 1/2 tsp Black peppercorns, freshly ground
- 1 tbsp Chives, snipped
Method
- Cover the dried porcini with 1 cup (240 ml) of just-boiled water and leave them to soak while you start the pot. Porcini are the flavor engine here: they carry a deep, meaty savoriness that fresh mushrooms alone cannot reach, and their soaking liquid becomes a free, dark stock.
- Sear the cremini in a dry pot over high heat in a single layer, undisturbed, until they release their water, it boils off, and the mushrooms brown. Crowding the pan steams them grey, so work in two batches if you must; the browning is where a soup this plain gets its backbone.
- Turn the heat down, add the shallots and garlic with a few tablespoons of water, and sweat until soft, about 5 minutes. Add the thyme sprigs, the drained porcini (chopped), the bouillon, and 3 cups (710 ml) water, then pour in the porcini soaking liquid slowly and leave the gritty last spoonful behind.
- Simmer, partly covered, for 15 minutes, then pull out the thyme stems and blend the soup with the oat cream until completely smooth. The blended mushrooms and oat cream give the velvety body that butter and cream usually supply, with no dairy and almost no fat.
- Return it to low heat, grate in the nutmeg, and add the black pepper. Off the heat, stir in the sherry vinegar: the acid lifts the whole pot and stands in for the salt the soup does not carry. Finish each bowl with snipped chives.
Nutrition
Estimated per serving: 120 calories, 5 g protein, 3 g fiber, 60 mg sodium. Computed from USDA FoodData Central reference values for the main ingredients. This is an approximation, not a laboratory measurement. How these are computed.
Cost per serving is estimated from US national-average retail prices for cheap staple forms, using BLS dried-bean prices and USDA produce prices. Prices vary by store and season, so treat it as a guide, not a receipt. How this is computed.
