“Tex” Richmond got rich the old-fashioned way; he inherited his father’s Texas ranch. After oil was discovered on his land (actually under it) he soon became a wealthy oil tycoon. Tex wasn’t very bright, didn’t care much for learning, and was proud of being unsophisticated. He didn’t know the difference between escargot and beef jerky. Like other conservative billionaires, Tex invested heavily in Republican politicians to preserve his lucrative fossil fuel business—the fate of the planet be damned. Even though Tex had his own private jet, he disliked traveling, and felt completely out of sorts in fancy restaurants. But Tex had an appetite for good food, so wherever he went he had his servant head to the closest restaurant and bring back whatever they claimed was the best thing they had on the menu. One day around noon, Tex was on business in Brooklyn, New York when he got hungry. So he asked his servant to bring him lunch from the closest eatery—which was a Jewish delicatessen just around the corner. The servant left and was back in twenty minutes—with a bowl of soup.
“Price is no object, and you bring me soup?” he asked incredulously.
“It’s Matzo ball soup,” his servant replied. “They assured me it was the best thing in the house.”
His servant handed him the bowl and Tex looked into the steaming broth containing two large matzo balls. “Matzo balls? I never heard of anyone eating matzo balls! What the hell; I’ll try it.”
Tex tasted the soup. The chicken broth, “Jewish Penicillin,” warmed his soul. Then he hesitated and finally took a bite out of a matzo ball. This eyes grew wide. “This is delicious! I never tasted anything so good! Who would have believed matzo balls would be in soup? Tell me, besides the balls, what other part of the matzo critter is good to eat?”
Forgive me for this shaggy dog attempt at humor. But tonight was the last night of Hannukah, and my daughter had me watch two episodes of a cooking show where novice cooks attempt to create bakery masterpieces, only to produce supposedly hilarious failures. The decorated dreidel-shaped frosted cakes on a stick, didn’t even come close. If they wanted something that truly represented Jewish cuisine, they should have had them make chicken soup—or better still Matzo ball soup.
So first a disclaimer. If I were a contestant on that show, I would have failed too. You can put everything I know about cooking into a teaspoon. But having a big appetite (and stomach to prove it) I know more about eating than cooking. I can cook, a little. I “fix” my own meals and use whatever tricks I can to make otherwise simple food taste tasty.
However my grandmother was a gourmet cook. She made the best Matzo ball soup I ever tasted in my life. Indeed, her Matzo ball soup was one of the best things I ever tasted in my life. Unfortunately, she never taught anyone in the family to duplicate her culinary masterpiece; nor is there a recipe to try to duplicate it. Her recipe died with her. No Matzo ball soup I ever tried since then has even come close.
The other day was cold and rainy, plus I had a sore throat. So I opened a can of Progresso Chicken and Noodles with Rosemary soup. (Rosemary makes pork, lamb, and almost everything taste better.) There is nothing like hot soup on a cold day, but canned and bland rhyme. So I sprinkled the last of the crushed rosemary leaves left in the small spice jar onto the soup. Then I got brainstorm and remembered the secret to great chicken soup: Take out the chicken in the soup, and replace it with the fresh cooked chicken in the refrigerator. Fortunately, the other night I tried making chicken fingers and had leftovers. As chicken fingers they were just fair, but as chicken to add to the soup they were perfect. All I had to do was slice them and heat them in the soup. (To be completely honest, I was too lazy to remove the small square chunks of white meat already in the canned soup, but as they at least looked good.)
When I ate the soup, the chicken I added was superb. Just to compare, I then tried the chicken that came in the can. It may have looked good, but was dry and tasteless. I chewed—and chewed—and chewed—but sans flavor, the stringy mess had to be expectorated as it was too unpalatable to swallow.
Yet chicken and noodle soup doesn’t even come close to Matzo ball soup. In fact, Matzo balls soup is a delicacy in Jewish culture for the same reason shark fin soup is a delicacy in Chinese culture. As anyone who ever attended a Jewish Seder on Passover, a holiday celebrating the Jewish people’s deliverance from slavery in Egypt, already knows, Matzo, or unleavened bread, is barely edible. No wonder it’s called “the bread of affliction.” It’s like the driest worst cracker you could ever eat. It doesn’t really taste awful, but what little taste it has is worse than dry white bread. If Jewish ritual didn’t require it, no one would ever eat it. It’s that bad.
So too, are shark fins. No one would want to eat a shark fin. Yet it makes a great soup. How is this even possible?
There are three principle ingredients to making soup. The water, the ingredients which provide flavor, and the ingredient which absorb flavor. For instance, if you simmer chicken in water, the flavor will drain from the chicken into the water creating chicken broth. Much of this flavor comes in the form of chicken fat, which drains from the chicken into the water. Other ingredients which provide flavor may include vegetables like carrots and celery. By the time the broth is delicious, the ingredients that provided the flavor are drained of flavor. The carrots and celery, which provide color, are still soft and palatable, but the chicken isn’t.
However, to make great soup you need more than water and chicken and veggies. The best soup has something that, like a magnet, attracts and absorbs the flavors. Noodles do this in noodle soup, but noodles are too thin to absorb much flavor. Big round Matzo balls are perfect. They have little taste of their own, but soak up all the flavors of the soup like a dry sponge. The broth still tastes good, but the matzo ball tastes fantastic. Of course shark fins do the same thing. The shark fin doesn’t provide flavor, but provides “texture.” Like the matzo ball, all the flavors that were leeched into the broth are absorbed into the now palatable shark fin.
Yet to truly have great Matzo Ball soup, you should extract the chicken drained of flavor and natural juices (chicken fat) and replace it with freshly cooked chicken, such as rotisserie chicken or sliced fried chicken. (To avoid waste, serve the tasteless chicken to your cat.) Now you will have delicious chicken, delicious broth, and especially delicious melt-in-your-mouth Matzo balls.