Basque Vegetable Soup

When my brothers worked at the BSA camp at Silver Lake during the summer the rest of the family sometimes visited them. When we did my dad liked to take us all to dinner at a Basque restaurant in Gardnerville.   That was my introduction to Family Style Basque food, bowls of a cabbage vegetable soup, French bread, salad, pickled tongue, beans, French fries, and your choice of an entrée, steak, chicken, fish, or lamb and for dessert a simple scoop of ice cream. 

When Thom and I moved to Delano my dad asked us to find a Basque Restaurant. We asked around and "Woolgrowers " in Bakersfield was a favorite of many, owned and run by a local family.  We tried a different Basque Restaurant a few times but finally decided that Woolgrowers for us was the best.  We always had a meal at Woolgrowers when Mom and Dad came to visit.   We had many celebrations there and it's still one of our favorite places to go.

One issue of our local newspaper published the recipe of the soup from the Woolgrowers Restaurant.  I've kept the newspaper clipping and have made this soup many times.  I love to serve this soup with a simple salad, iceberg lettuce, tomato, red onion, thin sliced green bell pepper and a dressing of red wine vinegar and olive oil, salt and pepper.   If I have time I will marinate the tomato, onion and pepper with the vinaigrette at least an hour, makes all the difference with the salad.   The restaurant serves the soup in a large family style bowl with beans (pinto), French bread and butter.

Ingredients

3 carrots, chopped

3 large potatoes, diced into small cubes 1/4 inch squares

2 leeks, chopped

1 small cabbage, chopped

1 small can tomato sauce

Salt and Pepper to taste

1 Tablespoon chicken base

1 cup chopped onion

1/2 tsp thyme

10 cups water

Sauté onion in a little olive oil until soft, add all chopped vegetables to a large pot.  Add in chicken base and water, tomato sauce, thyme and salt and pepper.  Simmer for 2 hours

Serve with French Bread, simple salad, and your choice of entrée.  For a more traditional Basque dinner, serve in courses, soup, then salad with marinated tongue, and then the entrée with French fries, green beans and of course as much of the soup, salad and bread as you want.