While I’m vis­it­ing all things Philadel­phia this week, I’ve opened up Cook­ing In Stilet­tos to some FABULOUS blog­gers I adore.  First up is the one and only (Some­times!) Serendip­i­tous Girl aka SSG dis­clos­ing her “secret sum­mer romance”…

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A Secret Sum­mer Romance

by SSG

I have a secret … I love soup.

I wish it was more scan­dalous, really.  Like I love soup AND I slept with a celebrity.  But the secret really is that I just love soup. 

A hearty lentil and sausage stew in the fall, slow cooked onions sim­mered in beef broth and topped with melted Gruyere on toast in the win­ter.  A bowl of home­made chicken noo­dle to com­bat the snif­fles or a sim­ple tomato soup to com­bat a rainy after­noon.  Surely “hearty” stems from its root word, heart.  And I can’t think of another place that warms mine more than being wrapped up in a soft blan­ket on the couch, Pride & Prej­u­dice queued up on the DVD player, spoon poised, ready to make the first plunge into warmth and comfort.

That is, until summer.

Soup and I have to go on the equiv­a­lent of a “Ross and Rachel” break.  Where instead of scrap­ing the last bit of soup from the bowl, I scrape what­ever veg­eta­bles I can pull together with­out hav­ing to turn on the stove.  I dab­ble with strolling through the farm­ers mar­ket in flip flops, warmed instead by the early morn­ing sun.

But deep down, I miss soup.

There are cold soups, sure.  But gaz­pa­cho can get old after a while.  And while the can­taloupe soup I had at New York City’s Home one hot sum­mer evening was deli­cious, it was too light to make a full meal.

I would just have to wait.

Or would I?

Enter the June 2009 issue of Martha Stew­art Liv­ing where “Soups on Ice” caught my eye.  While the title of the arti­cle ini­tially had me envi­sion­ing Dis­ney sized bowls of soup on ice skates, com­ing soon to a rink near you!  I quickly for­gave her after see­ing page after page of Spicy Tomato, Fresh Pea and But­ter­milk, and Cucum­ber Basil & Mint.  And then my heart stopped when I saw “Corn & Coconut.”   Described as “farm fresh famil­iar and sur­pris­ing all at once” it had a hum­ble list of ingre­di­ents.  Jalapeno, corn and coconut milk are boiled together with water, pureed, chilled and strained before get­ting to know each other a bit bet­ter in the fridge.  On some warm Port­land days I’d like to climb right in there with them. 

The soup, when fin­ished with a squeeze of fresh lime juice and a few turns of the pep­per mill, was the per­fect accom­pa­ni­ment to a crisp Pinot Gris and salad.  Hearty?  Yes.  But cool and refresh­ing with a hint of com­plex­ity … though all really quite sim­ple in the end.  Just like a sum­mer romance should be.

Corn & Coconut Soup
Serves 4

Bring 1 jalapeno chile, seeded and chopped, 3 cups fresh corn ker­nels, 1 can (14 oz) light coconut milk, and 2 1/2 cups water to a boil in a medium saucepan.  Reduce heat, and sim­mer until corn is ten­der, about 20 min­utes.  Fill­ing a blender halfway and cov­er­ing with a kitchen towel, puree soup in batches (I used my immer­sion blender).  Strain through a coarse sieve into a large bowl; dis­card solids.  Sea­son with salt and pep­per.  Chill soup at least 3 hours or up to overnight.  Stir in 1 table­spoon fresh lime juice.  Gar­nish each serv­ing with fresh corn ker­nels if desired and sea­son with pepper.