Bless me, I broke the soup! Positively curdled it. How does one accomplish such a sorry state of affairs, wreck the steaming restorative, as it were? Get me a cookie to ease the pain.
When making soup on a chilly day, you need only a dairy ingredient and high heat to find out how curdling - or "breaking" - happens. Any soup that contains an egg, milk, cream or buttermilk will curdle if heated too high.
I broke a good soup just this very week. Wunderculinarian Jeanne Ambrose and her daughter, Lindsey, have a fabulous cookbook called Heartbreak Recovery Kitchen, in which they defend the right of everyone to throw a pity party now and then, in good taste, of course. If you jump into the book as I did, you'll find a recipe for Ale-Cheddar Soup With Bacon Croutons, and what could be warmer on a blustery day?
The soup called for half-and-half or milk - and for that reason, I should have held my thermometer or at least my elbow at the ready. When proteins are heated, they may coagulate to the degree that they separate from the liquid, causing that "pieces floating in a pond" look that makes a soup appear broken, or curdled. Heated eggs are particularly known for their curdling ability.
If you have a starch in the mixture, such as flour or cornstarch, that will raise the temperature at which protein coagulation happens, but you have to be careful, just the same. If a recipe calls for "simmering," many chefs agree that the temperature should not exceed 180 degrees, or well below the boiling point. If you boil the soup, you'll be sorry.
Mind the soup and keep watch. Simmer with the gentle spirit of a potions master. The soup is flavorful and aromatic, so handle with care.
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