This is one of those dishes that begins not with a recipe but a magical mystery tour through my refrigerator during which I play a quick game of matchmaker and the winner is dinner. It may sound contrived, but I actually find that it’s kind of entertaining and, by starting from leftovers, some of the cooking is already done before I even start. Bonus points: fresh meals are made without wasting food I’ve already invested energy into preparing.
Which bring us up to my inventory. A cold soup sounded like a grand idea on this muggy weekend, and I had a bag of frozen cantaloup I wanted to evict from my freezer. My Google research turned up one or two melon soup recipes that used ginger and lemon juice as ingredients. I had neither of these on hand, but providence provides! What I did have was a flat batch of homemade ginger beer (yeast fail!) that I refused to toss on principle, certain I could find a way to incorporate it into something at some point. And what is ginger beer but a sweetened broth of already juiced lemons and grated ginger?
It was an idea I decided to run with, and this tasty soup was ours for dinner. Done any matchmaking of your own lately?
Cantaloup Soup
5 cups cantaloup, fresh or frozen
1 1/2 cups strong ginger beer
1/2 cup Greek yogurt
1 tsp. salt
fresh grated nutmeg to garnish to taste
Place cantaloup in a bowl and pour over the ginger beer. Let sit at room temperature for one hour, allowing fruit to thaw (if using frozen) and beer to lose its carbonation. Add yogurt and salt and puree using an immersion blender. Chill soup completely (if you’ve used frozen fruit, soup will already be nicely chilled and can be served immediately).
Dish soup into small bowls or glasses, garnish with a few scratches of fresh nutmeg.
