🇵🇹 Portugal · Alentejo
Sopa de beldroegasPortuguese purslane soup
A summer Alentejo soup of purslane (beldroegas) simmered with potatoes, olive oil and garlic, finished with poached or stirred-in eggs and often poured over bread or served with a slice of Alentejo bread and cheese.
Origin and history
A soup of the Alentejo, the plains of southern Portugal, where wild greens are gathered in the fields; the local saying is that in the Alentejo a soup can be made from any herb. One Portuguese food site links the bread-and-egg soup tradition to the Arab-influenced açorda of the early Middle Ages, though that is a tradition's account rather than a documented line. Purslane is eaten in summer, and spinach or lettuce stand in out of season.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 4 servings
- Total time
- 1 h
- Hands-on
- 35 min
Ingredients
- 500 g1.1 lb (about 10 cups loosely packed) purslane (beldroegas), thick stems removed, leaves and tender tips washed well
- 500 g1.1 lb floury potatoes, peeled, sliced about 1 cm (1/2 in) thick
- 1 large onion, thinly sliced
- 1 head garlic, outer papery layers removed, the head kept whole with its inner skin
- 100 mlscant 1/2 cup olive oil
- 1 tsp sweet paprika (colorau)
- 1 bay leaf
- 1.5 L6 1/4 cups water
- 4 eggs, one per person
- 1 splash wine vinegar
- 4 thick slices day-old Alentejo-style country bread
- 80 g3 oz dry, hard sheep or goat cheese, cubed or shaved, optional but customary
- salt and pepper, to taste
Method
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1. Warm the olive oil in a wide pot over medium heat and cook the sliced onion for about 8 minutes, until soft and lightly golden.
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2. Add the purslane, bay leaf and paprika and stir for about 5 minutes, until the leaves have wilted and taken on the oil.
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3. Pour in the water and bring to a boil.
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4. Drop in the whole garlic head and the potato slices, season with salt and cook at a steady simmer for about 15 minutes, until the potatoes break easily when pressed.
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5. Crack the eggs one at a time into the simmering soup, add the cheese if using it, and poach for about 5 minutes, until the whites are set and the yolks are still soft.
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6. Add the splash of vinegar, simmer for 1 minute and take the pot off the heat. Taste for salt and add pepper.
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7. Put a slice of bread in each warm bowl, lift an egg onto each slice with some potato, ladle the broth and greens over, and serve at once, with a few cloves from the garlic head on the side.
Notes
- Purslane is a succulent wild green that grows in Alentejo fields in summer, and it gives the soup a faintly sour, slightly slippery body that thickens the broth. When it is out of season, a Portuguese cook uses spinach or lettuce, and the soup loses its tang: add a little more vinegar to make up for it.
- Eggs and bread are what make this an Alentejo soup rather than a plain green soup. Some cooks poach the eggs in the pot as here; others stir them in beaten, and others serve a simpler version with no eggs and only shavings of fresh goat cheese on top.
- A second tradition purees part of the potatoes and stems into the broth for a smoother soup and keeps the leaves and diced potato whole. Both ways are home cooking, and neither is a separate soup.
- It is a close cousin of the Alentejo acordas (bread soups) but is built on potato and greens and the bread is only the bed under the broth. The site has a page on sopa de tomate alentejana and on sopa de ajo for neighbouring bread-and-egg soups.
- Make it just before serving: the purslane turns dull if it sits, and the eggs overcook on reheating.
Adapted from e-konomista: Sopa de beldroegas (Alentejo) and Teleculinária: Sopa de beldroegas à alentejana.
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