№ 45Krējuma zupa ar vēžiem

Cream of crayfish soup Serves 4 · 1¼ hours · Adapted from the 1796 recipe; not yet tested.

The book gives half a kāls of crayfish, ½ stops of milk, ½ stops of cream and 3 egg yolks, which converts to about 15 crayfish, 640 ml, 640 ml and 3.

Ingredients

• 15 live crayfish (or whole cooked ones, see Notes)
• Salt, for the cooking water
• 650 ml whole milk
• 650 ml single cream
• 3 egg yolks
• 1 tsp sugar
• To serve: 1 tbsp sugar mixed with ½ tsp ground cinnamon
• Optional: finely grated zest of ½ lemon

Method

1. Rinse the crayfish and discard any that are dead. Bring a large pan of salted water (about 1 tbsp salt per litre) to a rolling boil, drop in the crayfish and boil for 5–6 minutes, skimming off the foam as it rises. Drain and leave until cool enough to handle. 2. Pull off the top shell of each head and remove the small stomach sac just behind the eyes; it is bitter and gritty. Put everything else (shells, claws and tail meat) in a food processor and pulse until finely crushed, or pound it in a mortar. 3. Bring the milk to the boil in a saucepan, add the crushed crayfish and simmer gently for 10 minutes, stirring now and then so it doesn't catch. 4. Pour through a colander set over a bowl, pressing hard on the shells to get all the liquid out. Then strain again through a fine sieve to catch any bits of shell. 5. Return the crayfish milk to a clean pan, add the cream and bring almost to the boil. 6. Whisk the egg yolks in a bowl. Whisk in a ladle of the hot soup, then pour it all back into the pan, whisking. Stir over low heat until the soup thickens slightly; don't let it boil, or the yolks will scramble. Stir in the sugar. 7. Pour into a tureen or bowls and sprinkle with the cinnamon sugar, and with lemon zest if you like.

Notes

• What the book says vs. what we added: the book boils half a kāls of crayfish in water with a little salt, skimming them repeatedly, takes the bitter part out of the head and pounds the rest. It boils the pounded crayfish in the milk, strains it through a colander, adds the cream and, when it boils, beats in the yolks and a small piece of sugar. Cinnamon sugar goes on top, and "some" add grated lemon peel. Warming the yolks first (step 6) and the second straining through a fine sieve (step 4) are our additions.
• Counting crayfish: a kāls was usually 30, so half a kāls is about 15. In places it meant 60 or more, which would make a stronger soup. The word we read as "repeatedly" (kārtām) is also uncertain.
• Crayfish: cook only live crayfish, dropped straight into fast-boiling water; many cooks chill them in the freezer for 20–30 minutes first to make them torpid. Frozen whole cooked crayfish work too: thaw them and start at step 2. The ones sold in Nordic shops are usually cooked with dill, which will show in the soup.
• Sugar and cinnamon: sweet seasoning on a crayfish soup is genuine 18th-century taste, not a mistake. The sugar in the soup is very little; the cinnamon sugar on top is what you'll notice.
• A smooth soup: all the crayfish meat goes into the pounding, so the soup has nothing to chew on. Keeping a few tails back as a garnish would be our change, not the book's.