Vichyssoise

Name: Vichyssoise
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 35 min
Total time: 4 h
Yield: 6
Cuisine: France / United States
Ingredients: 4 large leeks, white and pale green parts only, cleaned and sliced into rounds; 600 g floury potatoes (Maris Piper, King Edward, or Yukon Gold), peeled and diced; 1 medium white onion, finely sliced; 60 g unsalted butter; 1 litre good chicken stock (or vegetable stock for a vegetarian version); 200 ml double cream (heavy cream); 1 tsp fine white pepper (not black, the colour and flavour are important); 1 tsp fine salt (or to taste); To garnish: very finely sliced fresh chives, a thread of cream, white pepper

The cold cream of the Ritz-Carlton kitchen: leeks and potatoes simmered in chicken stock with butter and cream, puréed until silk-smooth and chilled until glacial: the soup that a homesick Bourbonnais chef created on a New York rooftop in 1917 and named for a spa town in France that had never heard of it

Origin: France / United States

From the journey of Potato.

Vichyssoise, pronounced 'vi-shee-SWAHZ', occupies a curious place in culinary history: it is almost certainly an American invention by a French chef, named after a French town that has no historical connection to the dish. Louis Diat, born in Montmoulins near Vichy in the Auvergne, was the head chef of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in New York. In 1917, he was serving lunch on the roof garden of the hotel during a summer heatwave. Drawing on his memory of the leek and potato soup his mother made in the Bourbonnais (which he and his brother would cool down with milk on hot days), he puréed the soup, enriched it with cream, and served it cold. He named it 'Crème Vichyssoise Glacée' after the spa town nearest to his birthplace. Louis Diat published the recipe in 1950; it became one of the most fashionable soups of the 20th century: a fixture of grand hotel menus, white-tablecloth restaurants, and the kind of American dinner party that aspired to French sophistication. Whether or not it derives from a specific French regional tradition (potage Parmentier; leek and potato soup; is certainly French), the cold, cream-enriched, blended version was Diat's creation, and the soup is simultaneously the most French-tasting of American soups and the most American-made of French ones.

Ingredients

Vegetables

4 large leeks, white and pale green parts only, cleaned and sliced into rounds
600 g floury potatoes (Maris Piper, King Edward, or Yukon Gold), peeled and diced

Aromatics

1 medium white onion, finely sliced

Fat

60 g unsalted butter

Stock

1 litre good chicken stock (or vegetable stock for a vegetarian version)

Cream

200 ml double cream (heavy cream)

Seasoning

1 tsp fine white pepper (not black, the colour and flavour are important)
1 tsp fine salt (or to taste)

Garnish

To garnish: very finely sliced fresh chives, a thread of cream, white pepper

Method

Melt the butter in a large pot over medium-low heat. Add the leeks and onion. Sweat very gently, covered, for 12–15 minutes until completely soft and yielding but not coloured. Any browning will give the finished soup a beige tinge and a cooked, caramelised flavour that contradicts the soup's essential delicacy.
Add the diced potato and stock. Bring to a gentle simmer (not a rolling boil; too vigorous and the potato begins to disintegrate unevenly). Simmer for 20–25 minutes until the potato is very tender.
Remove from heat. Blend in batches in a blender (not a hand-held stick blender; for this soup, you need the complete, high-velocity blending of a countertop blender to achieve the required silkiness) until completely smooth. Add the cream and blend again.
Pass the blended soup through a fine-mesh sieve, pressing with a ladle or spatula to extract all the liquid. Season with white pepper and salt. The soup should taste delicate and creamy when hot; it will need slightly more seasoning when served cold (cold dulls flavour).
Cover and refrigerate for at least 3 hours until thoroughly chilled. The soup should be genuinely cold, nearly icy, when served. Serve in chilled bowls (refrigerate the serving bowls for 30 minutes before use).
Ladle into chilled bowls. Garnish with a precise cross of very finely snipped chives laid on the soup's surface, a very thin drizzle of cream, and a single grind of white pepper. The presentation should be minimal and perfect.

Notes

Louis Diat (1885–1957) ran the kitchen of the Ritz-Carlton New York for 41 years, from 1910 to 1951, and is considered one of the most important figures in the history of American hotel cuisine. His cookbook 'Cooking à la Ritz' (1941) introduced vichyssoise to home cooks in the United States. The controversy over whether vichyssoise is French or American is largely academic; its roots are French (potage Parmentier) and its creation was American (New York, 1917), and it belongs to both traditions. The name 'Vichy' in France is now more associated with the wartime collaborationist government (the Vichy regime, 1940–44) than with the spa town, which has complicated the soup's French reception; in France, it is typically listed on menus simply as 'potage froid de poireaux et pommes de terre'; cold leek and potato soup.

The Gastrographer

Mapping Culinary History

To explore — select an ingredient below.

To explore — select an ingredient below · click any location dot on the map for recipes and stories · browse the information panel on the right · trace the full journey on the timeline.

Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control