Traditional Cuisine Challenge - Beverage - Wild Mushroom Soup

Soups, creams, liquid starters - there is probably no better category for a Pole than this one. Polish tradition assumes that each dinner consists of two dishes - soup and a main course, usually with meat and potatoes. I used to eat soup every day all my childhood, and although today you might not do two-course lunches that often anymore because people have far less free time than in the '80s and '90s, the tradition is still quite alive.

Almost everyone in the world knows tomato soup and chicken soup, but there are many more Polish soups and, frankly speaking, it was a challenge to choose one of them:

... are just a few examples from thousands of soups that I could list for you for hours.

In the end, I chose the mushroom soup but not the champignons soup, which is considered a separate type, but the forest mushroom soup.

Getting the right ingredient - mushrooms right from the forest

Picking mushrooms in Polish forests is still quite popular. In western Europe, it has already been banned for fear of widespread poisoning, so when you cross the Polish border with Germany, you are not able to legally go to the forest for mushrooms anymore. Poles still like to spend autumn mornings with a basket in their hand in the forest though.

Of course, to pick mushrooms you need to know them perfectly well. In Poland, we have several hundred types of mushrooms, some of which are edible, but many can lead to food poisoning, and in some cases death. Every year in our country, 20-30 people are hospitalized for mushroom poisoning, and 2-4 people die, so I never buy this ingredient from strangers - I only eat those that were collected by my father or grandparents. I don't know enough about picking mushrooms myself, except maybe for two species that are hard to confuse with their poisonous counterparts.

The mushrooms that I used for this dish were harvested in Poland by my father and his partner, and then it was dried. This is how I brought them to Argentina, where I am now living. Fresh mushrooms could not be transported across the border. Dried and packed in the hermetic bags, can last for months if not even years (I wouldn't know, I always eat them quite fast because it's truly delicious)

Mushroom soup, ingredients:

Preparation and nutricients

Dried mushrooms should first be soaked overnight in vegetable broth, then blended with parsley, cooked carrots, and onions. Separately, cook the potatoes cut them into small cubes, and add to the mixture. Boil everything, adding olive oil and seasoning with marjoram, salt, pepper, and garlic. At the last moment, add the cream, mix everything well and after two minutes of further cooking, serve hot.

Some people serve mushroom noodle soup instead of potatoes. This is also good - it depends on your personal preferences.

Mushroom soup is very low in calories. Of course, the number of calories will depend on the amount of cream added, but you can safely assume that the bowl provides up to a maximum of 140 kcal. Mushrooms are rich in B vitamins and trace elements. There is much more vitamin B2 in mushrooms than in vegetables. However, be careful not to eat them too often. I won't give you all the detailed nutritious information because I don't know that kind of thing, but the Internet knows, so just check THIS WEBSITE instead :)

Traditionally, mushroom soup is served in December during the holiday season. In addition, it is often found on tables at weddings and larger celebrations. Presumably, this is due to the extra effort of finding mushrooms in forests or, in the case of shopping for mushrooms in stores, with the high price of this ingredient.