If any food seems inherently calming, and even consoling, it is soup. Soup feels good when the weather gets cold. It restores our spirit and our vigor. (The first ΓÇ£restaurantsΓÇ¥ were eighteenth-century Parisian establishments that served rich soups to restore, or restaurer, the hungry citizenry.) In the old days, when a ΓÇ£soup bunchΓÇ¥ of vegetables and herbs cost a nickel and bones were free from the butcher, American home cooks routinely made soups from scratch. Today, the smell of soup simmering still symbolizes home cooking.
