Pumpkin Soup
To be avoided in times of cholera
The melon has been sliced by nature to be eaten with the family; the pumpkin, being larger, can be eaten with the neighbors. - Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, Les Etudes de la Nature, 1784
Robert Estienne’s 1549 Dictionnaire François-Latin is the first dictionary in France to list “Citrulle ou Citrouille ou Courge de Turquie”. No definition. Pierre-André Matthiole, Italian doctor, includes and groups citrouilles - today’s word for a variety of pumpkin - with cucumbers, melons, and pompons in his book of Commentaires on medicinal plants in 1572, making it confusing to understand exactly what the citrouille - or the cucumber, for that matter - was considered back then.
Potiron - also pumpkin - appeared just slightly later but wasn’t as common as citrouille for quite some time. In fact potiron wasn’t always the word used for a pumpkin; when it was listed at all, as it was in Estienne’s dictionary, it was often defined as a mushroom, fungus, boletus.
The pumpkin, citrouille or potiron or courge, came to France in the 16th century. As Joseph Favre wrote in the Dictionnaire Universel de Cuisine et d'Hygiène Alimentaire in 1890 “The squash was known to the Romans, but it does not seem to have been cultivated in France before Rabelais, to whom we owe the novel tradition in Paris of the annual crowning of the largest pumpkin.” He later adds “At Les Halles in Paris, they are frequently seen weighing no less than 50 kilos.” François Rabelais lived, worked, and wrote in the first half of the 16th century.
In 1615, Jacques Dalechamps differentiated the citrouille from cucumbers, melons, and pompons in his Histoire Générale des Plantes: “Its stem trails along the ground. Its flower is yellow. The fruit is marvelously huge, rotund, heavy, and is covered in a smooth, green, spotted peel or rind, white where it sits on the ground. Its pulp or flesh is moist and watery; in certain it is bland, in others it is slightly sour. The Italians eat the flesh during heatwaves to refresh themselves.” Not only is it refreshing, according to the author, good to eat for “hot sweats and and particularly when the tongue is very dry” but it is a delicate food, “bland but with a touch of sweetness” therefore perfect for those with delicate stomachs. Pumpkins with red flesh “are so sweetly flavored”. Potirons, on the other hand, “are full of venom (or poison) and kill the person.” I’m assuming potiron, in 1615, is still a mushroom.
By mid-century, pumpkins, or at least a couple of varieties of this fruit, seem to be commonly known and grown; agronomist and valet to Louis XIV Nicolas De Bonnefons gives extensive direction on planting, growing, and harvesting pumpkins - citrouilles, again categorized alongside melons, cucumbers, and suddenly potiron, the name now referring to a type of squash - in household gardens in his 1654 influential book Le Jardinier François, The French Gardener. De Bonnefons dedicates his book “to the ladies but also to the bourgeois (the upper middle-class) who have country houses close to Paris and don't want to go to the expense of maintaining a gardener” indicating that pumpkins, at least for a certain class, were commonly grown in France. À la Marie Antoinette in her fancy Trianon garden in her milkmaid outfit, no doubt.
De Bonnefons accompanying tome, the cookbook Les Délices de la Campagne, Country Delights, explains how to cut and prepare them. And he adds recipes using pumpkin, recipes that will remain a constant in many cookbooks from here on out. He first suggests the flesh be fricasseed with onion that has been sautéed and caramelized in butter, then seasoned with salt and spices “as one does with cucumbers”. He also has a recipe in which one blends cooked pumpkin with fresh butter, hard boiled egg yolks, fresh eggs, a little chopped parsley and herbs as well as spices. One dices andouillette sausage and chestnuts, cooks them in butter with chopped mushrooms, and serves them with the seasoned pumpkin purée. “Pumpkin,” he notes, “is also used in bread.”
And he offers a recipe for a potage or pumpkin soup, which is simply pumpkin precooked in a little water to which one then adds milk, salt, and pepper.
But De Bonnefons’ recipe for potage de citrouille or potage de courge, pumpkin or squash soup, is not the first. Very Excellent Cookbook, Very Useful & Profitable (Livre Fort Excellent de Cuysine Tresutille & Proffitable) had possibly one of the first written recipes for pumpkin soup in France, back in 1542, potage de courge: one is instructed to pre-boil the pumpkin, purée it, then add butter and milk, beef marrow, and “fin fromage” - possibly a creamy cheese like fromage blanc. He adds a little ginger and saffron to season and a bit of sugar for sweetness. In 1651, François Pierre de La Varenne has not one, but two recipes for pumpkin soup, potage de citrouille au beurre and potage de citrouille au lait, in Le Cuisinier François; cooked and puréed pumpkin is blended and simmered with butter, an onion stuck with cloves, pepper, and bread, then 3 or 4 egg yolks and broth are whisked in to create the first soup. In the second, the broth is replaced with milk. 5 years later, Pierre de Lune includes a similar soup recipe, potage de citrouilles au lait, in his book Le Cuisinier (1656), but rather than precooking his pumpkin in a bit of water, he sautées his, cut into tiny cubes, in butter with parsley, chervil, and salt. He then adds the cooked and seasoned pumpkin to boiling milk in a terracotta pot, serving his soup on toasted croutons, topping it with fried bread and a dusting of white pepper.
In 1690, Antoine Furetière gives a precise illustration of what a citrouille is in the Dictionnaire Universel, seemingly a different variety than Dalechamps’ “marvelously huge, rotund, heavy” pumpkin back in 1615: “The largest of all fruits that grow on the ground. It is cylindrical and oblong in shape. Pumpkins,” he continues, “are eaten in soups and fricassees.” The word now seems to be so common that it has moved over into vulgar vernacular or slang: Furetière’s definition for citrouille adds “A woman whose waist is large and badly shaped is figuratively called 'a large pumpkin’”.
One has to give a very slight nod of appreciation for the very slight modification provided by the Académie Française in their 1762 Dictionnaire. Following “A kind of fruit that grows large and creeps along the ground with its stem and leaves” they add “We say figuratively and vulgarly of a fat woman: “She's a fat pumpkin!” generously admitting that it is a vulgar expression. On the other hand, the Académie does confirm that this “kind of fruit” is used to make “pumpkin loaf, pumpkin soup, pumpkin fricassee.”
So let’s get back to the confusion a bit first. The citrouille - pumpkin - (Cucurbita pepo) - is distinct from the potiron - also pumpkin - (Cucurbita maxima) - both belonging to the Cucurbitaceae family. Both varieties of pumpkin are squash and are indeed related to melons, watermelons, cucumbers, and other gourds. Many claim that Christopher Columbus discovered this unusual plant in Cuba in 1492 while others say that Spanish explorer Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, who saw pumpkins in Florida in 1528, brought the first seeds back to Europe, where the new fruit took some time to gain widespread acceptance. And even others believe that at least some varieties were introduced to Europe by the Portuguese. Antoine Nicolas Duchesne, botanist at the Jardin du Roi in Versailles, organized the classification of over a hundred different squashes of the genus Cucurbita, accompanied by 258 drawings, in his Histoire Naturelle des Courges published in 1786. And finally, Charles Naudin, established a list of twenty pumpkin varieties, distinguishing the different varieties once and for all, in 1860. It wasn't until this time that the term courge (squash) came into general use in France to designate today's gourds, once botanical classification had been relatively stabilized.
The first French language dictionary - Dictionnaire François Contenant les Mots et les Choses (French Dictionary Containing Words and Things) by Pierre Richelet in 1680 did differentiate the citrouille from the potiron….
Citrouille: “a plant with a stem that trails on the ground, which produces a yellow flower, & which bears a cold & moist fruit, round, heavy, & covered with a smooth, green, & white bark on the side it lies on the ground.”
Potiron: “a kind of pumpkin (citrouille). It's a plant with a trailing stem that bears a round, large fruit covered with a yellow and red rind. Pumpkins (potirons) are difficult to digest. Some are good to eat and others are worthless. Those that are good to eat can be cooked, fricasseed, and sometimes used in soup.”
But while Richelet seems to indicate that it is the potiron one uses in cooking, cookbook authors continue to offer recipes for potage de citrouille, not potiron. François Massialot includes the same recipe for potage de citrouille au lait in Le Cuisinier Roïal et Bourgeois in 1691 as Pierre de Lune about 30 years earlier.
At the turn of the new century, Louis Lémery, botanist and chemist, takes a deep dive into the pumpkin (citrouille) in his book Traité des Aliments (Treatise on Food and the good and bad effects they can produce and the temperaments they suit ) in 1705. “While the flesh of the pumpkin refreshes and softens burning in the chest and tempers violent mood swings,” he states, “it does cause gas or wind (excite des vents) and produces coarse or horrid moods. Pumpkin is good for bad-tempered or sickly young people but is not good for the elderly or those with weak, delicate, or phlegmatic temperaments. They are easy to digest and are less harmful than cucumbers.” He gives no indication what one is to do with this food, other than “These pumpkins contain liqueur that we blend with a little rose water and sugar, and with which we make a very agreeable and very refreshing drink.”
Louis Lémery’s father, Nicolas, had already written Traité Universel des Drogues Simples just a few years earlier in 1698, saying about the pumpkin: “the flesh is hydrating and stimulating, suitable for tempering the heat of the entrails, and can be taken as a brew to quench the heat of the entrails….it is used in emulsions, broths, and infusions.”
The 1757 nutritional book Cuisine et Office de Santé (for those who live with economy and diet) agrees that the pumpkin - still citrouille - “refreshes greatly” and “softens the acerbity of the blood” as well as causing gas or wind. It is essential, the author demands, to always remember to eat it well-cooked, highlighting in strong italics “it must be used for soup in this way”… small cubes of the flesh are cooked in a small amount of water until mush (marmalade), add just the amount of boiling milk necessary.”
Jumping ahead a bit to include our favorite (well, favorite named) book entitled Le Cuisinier et le Médecin et le Médecin et le Cuisinier ou Le Cuisinier Médecin et le Médecin Cuisinier (The Cook and the Doctor and the Doctor and the Cook or the Cook Doctor and the Doctor Cook, the Art of Maintaining and Restoring One’s Health Through Proper Nutrition), a book published by the Society of Doctors, Chemists, Cooks and Catering Officers in 1855, we find the nutritional (or lack of them) benefits and health values of the pumpkin continue even a hundred years later. After defining the “citrouille (citrullus): common (or vulgar) name given to a type of squash; the citrouille musquée (curcubita montiata): a much sought-after fruit in France, and especially in America and Italy, because of the pleasant flavor of its flesh. It is refreshing”; and finally the “potiron: name of a variety of squash”, the authors include their opinions: “Their flesh constitutes a very healthy food, a little laxative, refreshing, not very nourishing. Not all stomachs can tolerate it, especially cold, sluggish stomachs. You must abstain completely from eating them during times of cholera.”
The authors then include a recipe for potage au potiron the same as all of the others, noting that the same can be made with the citrouille.
Even Joseph Favre was resolute: “In all kitchens run by intelligent people, we know that squash (see pumpkin) soup is refreshing and keeps the belly free. Pumpkin is a cold food that needs to be seasoned with stimulating condiments. Not very nutritious, but easy to digest, it is not suitable for bilious or sanguine temperaments.”
But back to the previous century and the evolution (or not) of our dish: In 1746, Joseph Menon includes a brief section devoted entirely to Potiron & Citrouille in La Cuisinière Bourgeoise stating quite clearly and adamantly, “Their only use in cooking is to make soup with milk.” His recipe is the same simple recipe of cooked, puréed pumpkin simmered with milk, butter, salt, and sugar then poured over bread which is allowed to soak until soft, thus thickening the soup. Just a few years later, Menon ups his pumpkin soup game in Les Soupers de la Cour, ou l’Art de Travailler Toutes Sortes d’Alimens (sic) Pour Servir Les Meilleurs Tables - Court Dinners, or the Art of Preparing All Kinds of Food to Serve the Best Tables - by cooking the soup in the cleaned out pumpkin shell which has been covered in meringue, dusted in sugar, then baked until the meringue has colored and caramelized. He whisks egg yolks into his soup to create something richer, and rather than soaking the bread in the soup to soften, the soup is now poured into the pumpkin shell over slices of grilled bread, creating more of a crouton effect, then serving…topped with the crown of the pumpkin shell, of course. Very elegant.
Through the rest of the century and well into the next, pumpkin soup made with citrouille remains very much what it always has been. It isn’t until the mid-19th century that the potiron finally makes its appearance. Urbain Dubois’ 1868 Cuisine de Tous les Pays includes a purée de courge au riz under the note “In the North, squash is known as potiron (pumpkin).” His recipe is the same offered by Edmond Richardin in the 1901 L’Art du Bien Manger as a potage purée de potiron: pumpkin and water are added to well sautéd onions which, once cooked, is puréed, then rice is added to the soup and allowed to cook. Dubois also points out that “for purées (I assume he includes potages or soups, as well), we naturally choose the best, with firm, fragrant flesh.”
Sophie Wattel’s 1886 Les Cent Mille Recettes de la Bonne Cuisinière Bourgeoise à la Ville et à la Campagne bursts at the seams with new recipes using pumpkin, both citrouille and potiron, from purées, one seasoned with fresh herbs, another with the addition of cream; another in which she fries cubes of pre-boiled pumpkin in butter and spices, spoons them onto a baking pan, covers them with grated Parmesan cheese, then browns it all in the oven. She makes a type of “choucroute” with pumpkin replacing the traditional cabbage, and, yes, a soup. Her Potage de Citrouille au Lait is similar to the others, the pumpkin sautéed in butter but now with fresh herbs, mixed with boiling milk, seasoned with salt, pepper, and sugar, and served over croutons of fried or grilled bread. Later in her book, under the heading potiron, she explains that she only uses this variety for soup, choucroute, or a type of pudding with cream and eggs blended into the pumpkin purée, the whole put in a baking dish, dotted with butter, and baked.
But most cookbooks from then on and well into the 20th century, most particularly cookbooks aimed at the home cook, recipes for the family, continue to offer the simplest of barebones recipes for pumpkin soup. Pumpkin cooked in a small amount of water, puréed, butter, and milk or water, seasoned with only salt and pepper. And a pinch of sugar. Often served over croutons. Some include sautéed onions, others add rice or pasta such as vermicelli. Occasionally one will add potatoes to give it more consistency, while others might suggest topping it with grated cheese. The great chef Auguste Escoffier calls this simplest of soups purée de potiron à la bourgeoise, giving it a classy boost. His purée de potiron à la ménagère (homemaker’s or housewife’s pumpkin soup) is the same with the addition of puréed white beans, a nice way, he explains, to use up leftover white beans from the night before. His purée de potiron au riz replaces the vermicelli used in the bourgeoise version with rice.
But like the onion soup, the French remain simple, focusing on and elevating a single ingredient, highlighting it with the barest minimum of additional ingredients. Henri-Paul Pellaprat, chef, co-founder of Le Cordon Bleu cooking school in Paris, and prolific author of cookbooks still considered influential references of French cuisine to this day, includes a super plain Soupe au Potiron in both his 1955 La Cuisine Familiale et Pratique and his 1950 classic L’Art Culinaire Française. Françoise Bernard, matron saint of French home cooking, offers households pretty much the very same recipe as was being made 4 centuries earlier: pumpkin puréed in a bit of water and a bit of butter, milk and rice are added, the soup seasoned simply with salt and pepper. “If you don’t really like rice, add 3 diced potatoes at the same time as the pumpkin instead.”
Plus ça change, as the French often say, plus c’est la même chose. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Pumpkin Soup
I created this recipe after eating a bowl of marvelous pumpkin soup at a circus - yes, a circus - on the outskirts of Paris, a single tent set up in a vacant lot. It’s best eaten with a swirl of cream, garlicky croutons, and lots of freshly grated gruyère or comté cheese.
3-pound (1 ½ kilos) slice of pumpkin
2 tablespoons (30 grams) unsalted butter
1 medium onion, peeled and chopped
2 ½ cups (625 ml) chicken broth or stock
Large pinch light brown sugar
Pinch ground nutmeg
¼ teaspoon paprika
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
⅔ cup (155 ml) light cream, more to serve
Freshly grated Swiss, Gruyère, Comté, or Emmental cheese to serve
Croutons, to serve, optional
Trim the pumpkin and discard the shell, seeds, and stringy bits. Cut the flesh into large cubes.
Melt the butter in a large pot, add the chopped onion, and cook, stirring, until soft. Add the cubes of pumpkin, the stock, and the sugar and bring up the boil.
Lower the heat, cover (I always leave the lid slightly ajar) and simmer for 30 minutes. The pumpkin should be meltingly soft.
Remove from the heat and purée either in a blender, food processor or, as I do, with a hand-held immersion blender, until perfectly smooth.
Stir in the nutmeg, paprika, salt and pepper to taste, and the cream. Heat gently until hot through but not boiling.
Serve with a swirl of either cream, sour cream, or fromage frais and pass around bowls of grated cheese and croutons.
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I’ve been meaning to follow up on citrouille vs potiron for nearly 50 years. What a harvest! Merci!
A lovely article about a lovely soup at the right season of the year. My recipe is very close, differing only in having a touch of clove instead of paprika, so, quatre-épices.