Gronkaalssuppe

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy-bottomed pot, 4 litre
• •Large pot for blanching
• •Heavy frying pan for the pork
• •Sharp knife and large cutting board
• •Whisk

Instructions

1. 1

   Blanch the kale

   Bring a large pot of well-salted water to a rolling boil. Strip the kale leaves from their tough central stems and tear them into rough pieces. Plunge the leaves into the boiling water and cook them hard for two minutes, pushing them down with a spoon so everything is submerged. Lift them out into a bowl of iced water and leave them there for a minute to stop the cooking. This is the step that sets the color and takes the raw edge off the leaves. Skip it and the soup goes dull and bitter. Do it and the green stays alive.

   Salt the blanching water like the sea. Timid salt gives you timid kale, and you're building the whole soup on this one step.
2. 2

   Chop the kale fine

   Drain the blanched kale and squeeze out as much water as you can with your hands. It will come out as a dense green ball. Place it on a board and chop it very fine, almost to a rough paste. The texture of the finished soup depends on this. Large pieces stay stringy in the bowl. Finely chopped kale melts into the cream and gives the soup its body.

3. 3

   Render the pork

   While the kale drains, put the pork cubes in a cold dry frying pan and set it over a medium heat. Starting cold lets the fat render out slowly, and you'll end up with crisp golden cubes swimming in their own rendered fat instead of dry burnt edges. Cook until the pork is deeply colored and the fat has run. Lift the cubes out onto kitchen paper and set them aside. Keep the rendered fat if you like and add a spoonful to the soup at the end.

4. 4

   Build the base

   Melt the butter in a heavy pot over a gentle heat. Add the diced onion and a small pinch of salt and sweat it slowly until translucent, about five minutes. You don't want color here, just softness. Scatter in the flour and stir it through the butter and onions to make a pale roux. Cook this for a full minute, stirring constantly. The raw flour taste needs to cook out, or it will haunt the finished soup.

5. 5

   Add the stock

   Pour in the stock a ladleful at a time, whisking after each addition to keep the roux smooth. Once everything is incorporated, bring the soup to a gentle simmer. It should start to thicken slightly and coat the back of a spoon. A good stock matters here more than almost anything else. A ham or pork stock gives the soup the smoky backbone it wants, but a well-made chicken stock will carry it too.

   If your stock is cold from the fridge, warm it first in a separate pan. Cold stock hitting a hot roux will seize up and go lumpy on you.
6. 6

   Simmer with the kale

   Stir the chopped kale into the simmering stock. Let it cook gently for ten minutes, stirring now and then. The kale will loosen into the liquid and the whole pot will turn a deep, forest green. This is the moment Jutland farmhouses smelled of on winter afternoons when the wind came in off the North Sea and the kitchen was the warmest room in the house.

7. 7

   Finish with cream

   Pour in the cream and stir it through. Let the soup come back to a bare simmer and cook for another five minutes until it thickens into something rich enough to hold a spoon upright for a moment before releasing it. Season with salt, black pepper, and a small grating of nutmeg. Taste it. Adjust. The soup should be deep and rounded, never sharp. The cream is what carries the kale from farmhouse green to something that tastes cooked with love.

8. 8

   Serve

   Ladle the soup into deep bowls. Place half a hard-boiled egg in the centre of each, yolk side up. Scatter the crisp pork cubes over the top. Grind a little more black pepper across the surface and serve at once with thick slices of dark rugbrod alongside. Eat it slowly. This is winter food, and winter food is meant to be sat with. Tak for mad.

Chef Tips

• •The season decides here. Kale is at its best after the first hard frost, from November through February. Summer kale works, but it's tougher and less sweet, and you'll taste the difference in the bowl.
• •A ham or smoked pork stock is the traditional choice and gives the soup its backbone. If you've cooked a ham recently, the liquid left in the pot is exactly what this soup wants. Otherwise, a good chicken stock carries it well.
• •Don't be afraid to chop the kale very fine. This isn't a chunky vegetable soup. The kale should melt into the cream and become part of the body, not float in pieces.
• •A small spoonful of the rendered pork fat stirred back into the pot at the end adds a smoky richness that feels distinctly Jutland. Use it or don't, but know it's there as an option.

Advance Preparation

• •The soup can be made a day ahead up to the point of adding the cream. Cool, refrigerate, and finish with the cream when you reheat it gently the next day.
• •The hard-boiled eggs and rendered pork can both be prepared several hours ahead and kept at room temperature or in the fridge until serving.
• •The finished soup keeps for three days in the fridge and reheats well over a gentle heat. Don't let it boil once the cream is in, or the texture can break.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 590g)