On the blog we get a lot of questions about how to combine various ingredients that you might have in your pantry. But last week, we had a postcard from a Mrs Trellis of North Wales, whose son had dug up a large and unusually beautiful hunk of granite from the garden, and wanted to know if we had any culinary tips for that. Well, Mrs Trellis, we do indeed. Stone soup is one of the easiest traditions in our kitchen, and we’re going to show you how it’s made.
Stone: The Secret Ingredient
You might not think that a billion-year-old geological formation would be a vital tool in the home cook’s arsenal. Surprisingly, almost all culinary traditions have some variation on stone cooking. The limestone quarries of Britain were the crucible for many Roman dishes. Conscripted legions passed the time between sorties by hacking off lumps of the calcite-rich landscape and frying them up with wild garlic and flatbreads. (See Gibbon’s Decline and Fall, chapter IV, subsection I, for more details of this practice, especially as detailed in the writings of Asinus Aprilii.)
Igneous cairns in Scotland and their neighboring islands to the North were often plundered for their bounty. Icelandic epic poems, such as the Njals Saga, tell us how vital were pumice and scoria to the trading routes across the North Sea. Obsidian was a harder sell, but even that could be combined with local mushrooms to form a hearty broth that could fill a Viking’s stomach. In more modern times, the Swedish-Norwegian War of 1814 was triggered by a dispute between two villages, on either side of the border, as to what color of basalt made the best nettle risotto. (The correct answer is, of course, brown. Sorry, Gottskår.)
So there’s a lot of history associated with the culinary use of rocks. You’ll have noticed a big variation in the types of mineral that work best with local flavors. Your local geology society will be able to give you more information, but there’s no harm in starting with whatever you find in your own back yard.
A few tips:
- Stick with natural rocks for stone soup. Concrete and cement block contain a lot of artificial flavors and preservatives.
- Avoid anything too small that you might accidentally swallow. Don’t even think of using gravel. We prefer to use stones of at least 8 inches in diameter, maxing out at whatever will fit in our stockpot. Don’t feel like you have to go silly in the other direction; if you can’t carry it into the kitchen without throwing out your back, there’s no point trying to make soup out of it.
- We recommend you start with soup, since it’s the easiest method for a beginner to get to grips with. Later, you can advance to more complex recipes such as stone cake, stone soufflé, and stones served up with liver and a nice Chanti.
About the Water for Stone Soup
Let’s get stuck in! Hopefully by now you will have selected your rock, and optionally given it a ceremonial name. (I recommend “Scrimshaw, Destroyer of Worlds”.) Give it a decent scrub to get off the worst of nature’s grime. Now, just as important as the choice of stone is the quality of your tap water. You may think “aha! I’ll just use a filter jug”, but think again. You’re trying to filter out calcium, iron and other flavors with one hand, while simply adding them back when you drop in the stone. So just go with plain old tap water. Unless your local city water is filthy or particularly foul-tasting, in which case please use Pellegrino or Fiji Water.
Fill your pot up to about 2 quarts with the water, and carefully drop in the stone. On a low-medium flame, bring the water up to a simmer, and maintain the temperature while you stir. Add a generous pinch of salt and some cracked black pepper. Continue to cook, stirring and tasting every once in a while. You can use whatever you like to stir; we happened to have a ham hock to hand. To give the soup a little color, we diced up some carrots, celery and onions, and threw them into the pot. If you need a thicker broth, you can chop up some potatoes or throw in some peas, both of which supply a good starchy base.
After about half an hour, you can discard your stirring utensil, taste one more time, turn down the heat and add any final flavorings you feel it needs. You might try a little creme fraiche or coconut milk. We also had a few fresh shrimp which we added at this point and cooked through just long enough to turn pink.
Don’t Forget to Remove the Stone
Finally, remove and discard your stone. Most municipal recycling facilities will not accept stones, but you can usually bury it in the garden where you found it, and, after a year or two of maturation, dig it back up for another round of soup-making. We’ve found the flavor fades after three or four rounds.
I hope you’ve had fun following along, please let us know if your own stone soup was a success, and if not, let us know. We’ve probably made the same mistakes as you, and there’s no shame in that.
Happy April 1.
Stone Soup
Ingredients
- 1 Stone approx 10 inches in diameter
- 2 quarts water
Instructions
- Place stone and water in a large (4 quart or larger) stock pot.
- Bring water to a simmer and maintain low heat for 30-40 minutes. Stir as needed and taste (see article for items we used to stir soup). When ready, remove and discard the stone and ladle soup into separate bowls.
- You can refrigerate or freeze any leftover soup.
5
came for the butternut squash and bacon pasta recipe.. stayed for the stone soup!
🙂
You’re very welcome! Thanks for reading!
Nice Mrs Trellis reference. 😉
I am very confused.
4.5
1
Going to make stone soup with my grandkids after reading the book to them. =) It will be delish!
I just completely fell for this. You guys are stinkers!
Ho ho!
Stone Soup is amazing!
I bet it imparts some badly needed minerals.
Where do minerals come from?. Rocks of course.
Bon appetite.
Stone soup has nothing to do with the stone. It’s fun to make. You get a BIG pot and a nice fire going of course burning it down to coals because it’s a soup not a BBQ. Get a nice smooth round RIVER rock. it needs to be visible and large enough that no one could possibly eat it or miss it
The stone soup will be made in the midst of your neighorhood and talk to the adults way ahead of time. Tell the children of the neighborhood to gather up to see the MAGIC stone. Fill it halfway with water and add the rock. Give a taste and let the children taste it and say “You know stone soup is always best with carrots Have one of the children go home and get carrots (parents will have it ready to give them. When they come back add in the carrots let it cook a bit taste it and say You know rock soup is oftentimes best with Peas. you get it now have each child go get what was setup ahead of time. Have some salt, pepper, rosemary etc on hand. Season as you go These are children so make sure everything is cut into small pieces..especially and beef or pork.. Make sure everyone has a bowl and give them samples as cooking time commences. When the pot is full and fully cooked everyone is served Have a nice big sit down right on the grass or dirt.
When everyone gets their fill ask what they thought of the “magic”rock soup and I bet they are all excited and would like to try it with chicken instead or Cabbage etc This is when everyone sits around the fire eating- there’s your true magic.
I promise you those children will NEVER EVER forget that day. Try to work in a little but of sharing is caring goodness.
I was in kindergarten when we made rock soup in our class on a single burner with a couple of pieces of stone slab etc under the burner and pot on top. Outside is better, BUT 20-30 kids and a couple adults can figure it out.
I was able to be a part of the magic rock soup so this was around 50 years ago.. I remember thinking this was the best soup I’ve ever eaten and the taste of the vegetables really stood out. (no canned stuffz)
When everything is done remove the rock let it dry and put it in a velvet type bag (Crown Royal!) but it was fancy to us kids.
The moral is that something can be greater than the sum of it’s parts and sharing can really be fun Remember it’s Magic!
The rock is invaluable so take it home (and it’s so rare its priceless) for next time everyone wants some more of that delicious rock soup And every time it’s made it’s different. The rock will smell pretty great which adds to the mystique.
This was quite a while after the Great Depression but I’ve always heard it originates from that time and neighbors hid their food and garden ingredients. If someone can bring some nice tough bread to butter up and warm on the pot lid its a plus.
Does anyone remember making rock soup?
-Joe D Cook
I remember making stone soup with my kindergarten teacher in our class. That was 34yrs ago! I searched the internet to make sure I remembered correctly, thanks for the article. I’m going to make stone soup with my kids this weekend.
Delicious!
How about kidney stone soup?
My father made this for our small family just shortly prior to his untimely death. I can remember that we just did not have the seasonings for your average broth. We lost our spice rack to a house fire just 3 weeks before. The taste was very Earthy. I can’t say that we wanted ‘earthy’, but rocks are what we had. My mother sent us out to gather a few dandelions and wild onions. Unfortunately, our landlord had just had the lawn mowed, so we did have to go ‘hunting’ in the neighbors yards in the wee hours of the morn. Father’s face was so badly destroyed when mother forgot to remove the stone that he we truly did not know it was him, even though he lay on the kitchen floor. I miss him dearly. Thank you for this recipe!! I will be adding carrots and salt. How much salt might make this too spicy?? Again, thank you! 🙂 <3 31/F/FL
I wish your family well! I say that even a bit of salt is way to spicy. Carrots, however, would go swell!
Thanks for sharing.
Sincerely,
Trinny xoxo
I will use my garlic rock and make a batch today…
Ah, a true purist I see.
Is this a real recipe? Someone in the comments said they “fell for it,” so now I’m confused.
Please don’t respond with a joke or sarcasm. I have autism and cannot tell.
It’s not really a real recipe. It’s based on a very old folk tale of a traveller who says he can make a delicious soup from just a stone and water. He heats it up, and offers to stir in some veggies just for extra taste. He then stirs the “stone soup” with a ham bone and of course that adds more flavor. It’s not a good idea to eat actual stones!
Tried the recipe using pumice, it gave me too much gas..
Says you.. When you’ve had nothing to eat your whole life except air like the Breatharian diet, then stone soup is a FEAST!
I actually think it’s tastes better without the stone cooked with it. And you can’t taste it properly at all with any seasoning. It is one of my favourite recipes of all time, but I think it might need a little tweaking, to personal preference and taste etc. + no one in the comments yet has mentioned the specific stone soup etiquette? You need to eat it with a mother of pearl spoon, as even silver and solid gold spoons can taint the flavour. I wouldn’t even dream of eating it without the proper spoon, like most sensible people.
Thanks! Excellent point about the spoon. The interested reader could do worse than check their local library for spoon/stone combination options. I believe it’s Dewey number 348.52, or 948.52. One of those. Or somewhere between those.
I am a Cub Scout leader and we are making Stone Soup for the 4th year at our “Scoutsgiving” with our official Pack 960 Stone. The kids love the tradition of reading the book around the campfire, everyone contributing their ingredient and working together to create the meal. It has easily become a favorite core memory day for the kids and their parents. This year we may mix up some drop biscuits to make a “Stones in a Swamp” Stone Soup!