When making some Jewish Penicillin (Chicken) Soup I started thinking at what point does stock technically become soup?

Are we sometimes just drinking very nice stock but calling it soup? You would not go into a restaurant and order a bowl of stock!

I started looking it up and got confused - with the mechanics of stock becoming a broth and then soup or being diverted into a consomm?.

Any simple explanations please!

Winton

I suspect the short answer is "it becomes a soup when you put it in a bowl and eat / serve it" :)

I imagine so too...

In posh restaurants, they do something to clarify stock, don't they?

But I suspect it's purely about adding the flavours or other ingredients that make it a finished product rather than an ingredient...

I think Pete (Ganders) has it right ! It changes from Stock to Soup when you say its soup !

Consider making a stock, some people might just boil up bones, others may roast off the bits and piece (Heston does for his chicken stock and adds milk powder), other might add bayleaves, carrots, onion, pepper etc.. so is their stock not a stock but already a soup, or is it a good stock with more flavour ?

Then you also get places that serve "soup" that is more or less just chicken stock maybe with a sprinkle of a herb or cream etc..

Steve

I reply from experience, rather than 'from the books'.

Stock came to prominence in 19th century French cuisine. A typical stock would use meat and bones, together with spices, herbs and veg. and boiled for up to eight hours. Common stocks were veal and chicken.

Today, stocks are usually made (at home) from bones and herbs and veg.

Stocks were/are made to provide a roast meat flavour to dishes.

Stocks are made by roasting meat and bones, or nowadays using carcasss which have been roasted, with black pepper, cloves, parsley, thyme, bay leaf, carrots and celery, the latter considered essential.

A broth in my book is a soup, but is what Americans call stock. A stock has no salt or fat. It is an ingredient, not a fait accompli. It can be used as a basis of a soup, but on its own would taste like savoury water. So I don't believe stock can ever be called soup.

I remember going to see my father in his kitchens (he was a head chef in many hotels) and can still remember the smell of the stocks. And I believe the quality of the stocks defines the quality of the kitchen produce (in a pro kitchen).