Food experiment: Ginkgo soup

I found a recipe for Ginkgo soup here:

“What do I do with these Ginkgo nuts now that I’ve peeled and boiled them?”
There was white bread left over from the dinner last night and that was just right for this recipe.

200g boiled Ginkgo nuts
200g day-old white bread
1 liter water
1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tsp Italian blend seasoning

Yield: 4 servings, 176 calories.

I toasted the nuts in a loosely covered Pyrex bowl on high power, in 30-second bursts. One time there was a boom and nut meats went flying, so I reduced to power to 80% until they had dried out. After that, I zapped them a few more 30-second bursts at full power until they were a nice golden color.

To dry out the white bread, I nuked it with the nuts for a minute, pulled it out of the microwave, and set it dry while the nuts finished toasting.

I ended up blending the nuts, white bread (sans crusts) and olive oil in a 2 1/2 quart Pyrex mixing bowl. With a hand immersion blender, I whipped the soup until it was smooth and silky. The soup chilled in the refrigerator while I diced and toasted the bread crumbs (along with a squirt of spray oil and Italin seasoning) to make some nice croutons.

This made 4 servings of approximately 290 ml.

The taste tester liked the texture. “It was smooth and light, with a nice, fresh flavor. The Italian seasoning on the croutons gave it a nice crunch.”