Ever Hear of Peanut Soup?

Cafe Society
1

When I was still in HS, in the 1980’s, my mother bought the book, at a garage sale, Yes, You May Have the Recipe by Maria Baker. Best purchase we ever made.

The book doesn’t look too special. Cheap plastic cover in a spiral. Very deceptive, if you ask me. You see this lady collected the best, only the best, recipes from her friends and acquaintances. We’ve all been to parties and banquets. And we have something there we just have to have the recipe too. This of course is the premise of the book.

Anyway finally, probably while still in high school, I made the Peanut Soup recipe. It’s basically chicken and rice soup, peanut butter and something hot. Some people use Tabasco sauce (just to taste). She adds Curry Powder—which what makes this recipe, if you ask me. (She also adds two tablespoons of catsup for some reason, which seems to help too.)

Anyway I cheated and used canned chicken and rice soup. You realize a purist would point out you have to make it from scratch.

Where do they eat this soup? Tell me all you know. Please, please. I live in Michigan. And I’ve never heard of it. Our loss though, if you ask me.

Also a little background. George Washington loved a Cream of Peanut Soup. In fact it was reportedly his favorite. This must have an interesting story, because you realize that peanuts come from Africa.

As I said I would appreciate any input. :slight_smile:

EDIT: Oh, and I now make a vegan version of this recipe. Vegan Chick’n Soup, peanut butter and curry Powder. I can’t tell the difference. :slight_smile:

2

Probably based on African groundnut stew recipes.

3

Sounds yummy. I’ll have to YouTube it this week.

4

Maybe look for an Ethiopian restaurant.

5

When I was an undergraduate, a student from Africa used to make Peanut Butter Soup, but the recipe doesn’t sound like the OP’s

6

This sounds like Thai Chicken Peanut soup, without the coconut milk and other ingredients that were not commonly available back then.

7

I’ve had it at a historical restaurant in Alexandria, VA.

Gadsby’s Tavern Restaurant

8

I had it somewhere near Mount Vernon, when I went on a history tour. Delicious, as I recall. I also heard about George Washington’s partiality toward it.

You know that Washington was a big barbeque lover too?

9

Our very own @VOW has a recipe for peanut soup, which I have made. It’s very good! Vegetable or chicken broth, peanut butter, dairy or nut milk, a little bit of cayenne and a lot of nutmeg.

There’s also Nhopi, which is squash (I use butternut when I make it), peanut butter, cinnamon and ginger. There’s a Zimbabwean restaurant here that makes a really, really good one.

10

Yes, it’s a stew common in West Africa. Here’s our variation on it, which is excellent:

African Chicken, Peanut and Yam Stew

2 pounds chicken meat, cut into bite-sized pieces

1 tsp salt

1 15 oz. can whole tomatoes in juice

¼ cup water

2 TBSP tomato paste

¼ cup peanut oil

1 medium onion, chopped

4 garlic cloves, minced and mashed into paste with 1 tsp salt

¾ tsp cayenne pepper (or to taste)

½ cup smooth peanut butter at room temperature

1-3/4 cups reduced sodium chicken broth

1 lb sweet potato or yam, cut into 1 inch chunks

Sprinkle chicken with salt and let stand for 30 minutes.

Pulse tomatoes with juices in a food processor until finely chopped.

Stir water into tomato paste in a small bowl until smooth.

Pat chicken dry. Heat oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium-high until hot, then brown chicken. Remove from pan. Pour off excess oil, leaving about 2 TBSP, then add onion and cook over medium heat until lightly golden, about 2-3 minutes. Add the chicken, tomatoes, tomato paste mixture, garlic paste and cayenne to pan (or use a pot, if needed).

Whisk together peanut butter and one cup broth in a bowl until smooth, then add to chicken along with remaining ¾ cup broth, stirring to combine well. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, covered, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking, about 30 minutes. Add yam chunks and simmer until tender, about 10-12 minutes. Serve over rice, if desired.

We’ve also made this without the chicken for vegetarian friends.

11

My first thoughts are Africa and Thailand. Then I figure wherever they grow peanuts. Hmm, another POTUS was from Georgia.

https://www.google.com/search?q=georgia+peanut+soup&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS798US798&oq=Georgia+peanut+soup&aqs=chrome.0.0i512.5625j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Scrolling down, found this:

First Lady Rosalynn Carter was known for serving local flavor at the White House. She wanted to give her guests a taste of Southern cooking. And this peanut soup was one item on the menu that packed the taste of the South, particularly simple life in Plains, Georgia.

12

If the OP lives in the SE part of Michigan, the Blue Nile is a fantastic Ethiopian restaurant. One of my wife’s and my favorites. I don’t see any peanut soups on the menu though (other than a soup of the day which varies and may be peanut-based):
http://www.bluenilemi.com/

13

Canned cream of chicken soup served at White House events? That must be unique.

The African stew sounds delicious, but I doubt Colonial recipes included tomatoes. They were thought to be poisonous until sometime in the 1830s, as I recall.

Asia and Africa were the first places I thought of too. The combination of chicken broth with something hot also reminds me of a Precolumbian Mesoamerican recipe, but with bitter chocolate instead of peanuts (though I wonder now if other kinds of nuts could have been used)

14

African Peanut Soup is a signature dish at an eatery in Fairhaven (Bellingham), WA.

The Original African Peanut Soup

This often-copied-never-duplicated recipe was created in the fall of 1985 to compliment the movie playing across the street “Out of Africa”. The ginger root, chilis, and garlic give it a distinctive, spicy taste which some people call “addictive”. This recipe has appeared in other cookbooks, including the Colophon’s Best Recipes.

Blend in food processor to create soup base:
1 oz Fresh Ginger Root, scrubbed and diced
2 Cloves Garlic
1 tsp Crushed Chili Peppers
3 1/4 cups Diced Tomatoes, canned or fresh
1 3/4 cups Dry Roasted Unsalted Peanuts
1 small Onion, chopped

Place soup base in Pot, Add the following. Cook to 165 degrees:
1 1/2 cup Chicken Stock
3 cups Water

Add to thicken:
1/4 cup Melted Butter
1/4 cup Flour

Finally Add:
2 cups Diced Tomatoes, canned or fresh
1/2 lb Cooked and cubed Turkey or Chicken

Hints: Whisk warm Roux into soup and simmer to thicken. Add final tomatoes to thin and add chunkiness to soup. Thin with water to desired consistency.

(For vegetarian version, leave out the turkey and use vegetable stock instead of chicken stock. Garnish with Peanuts. Serves 6-8 people.

15

We sell an African Peanut Soup at my store. IIRC, it has chicken and rice in it. It always sells well, but opening the soup kettle and getting a big whiff of peanut butter always kinda turns me off from it, so I have yet to try it.

16

I think I’ve had that before. I remember having a coconut curry soup with peanuts that was delicious and I think that was it. The peanuts really add a good textural element to the soup. It was great.

(I think the peanuts were chopped, not into tiny pieces but not left whole or halved.)

17

Unfortunately, this is a pleasure denied to those of us who are now dentally challenged. :cry:

18

How about peanut drink?

19

George Washington Carver of Tuskegee Institute printed 105 peanut recipes in his 44 bulletins to farmers. He also developed more than 300 industrial uses for the legume. What a genius he was!

https://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/carver-peanut/

20

My mother has told us the story many times about how her school’s cafeteria served peanut butter soup during WWII. It wasn’t anything like the delicious-sounding recipes posted on this thread; it was exactly what it sounded like - peanut butter mixed with either milk or (more likely) water, and heated up. Even kids on the verge of starvation had a hard time eating that.