Model Number

17

Commercial soup

Packets of soup

Commercial soup became popular with the invention of canning in the 19th century, and today a great variety of canned and dried soups are on the market. Dr. John T. Dorrance, a chemist with the Campbell Soup Company invented condensed soup in 1897.^[3] Today, Campbell's Tomato,Cream of Mushroom and Chicken Noodle soups are three of the most popular soups in America. Americans consume approximately 2.5 billion bowls of these three soups alone each year.^[3]Canned Italian-style soups, such as minestrone are also popular.

Canned soup can be condensed, in which case it is prepared by adding water (or sometimesmilk), or it can be ready-to-eat, meaning that it only needs to be warmed. Canned soup can be prepared by heating in a pan or in the microwave. The soups are often used as a simple base for homemade soups, with the consumer adding anything from a few vegetables to eggs, cream and pasta.

Condensing soup allows it to be packed into a smaller can and sold at a lower price than other canned soups. The soup is usually doubled in volume by adding "a can full" of water or milk (about 10 ounces).

In recent years, the canned soup market has exploded with so-called "ready-to-eat" soups, which require no additional water to make. Microwaveable bowls have expanded the ready-to-eat canned soup market even more. The plastic microwaveable bowls offer convenience in the workplace and are popular lunch items.

Oriental-style soup mixes containing ramen noodles are marketed as an inexpensive instant lunch, requiring only hot water for preparation.^[4] Vegetable, chicken base, potato, pasta and cheese soups are also available in dry mix form, ready to be served by adding hot water.

History

William-Adolphe BouguereauSoup

The word soup originates from "sop", a dish originally consisting of a soup or thickstew which was soaked up with pieces of bread. The modern meaning of sop has been limited to just the bread intended to be dipped.

The word restaurant was first used in France in the 16th century, to describe a highly concentrated, inexpensive soup, sold by street vendors called restaurer, that was advertised as an antidote to physical exhaustion. In 1765, a Parisian entrepreneuropened a shop specializing in restaurers. This prompted the use of the modern wordrestaurant to describe the shops.

In America, the first colonial cookbook was published by William Parks in Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1742, based on Eliza Smith's The Compleat Housewife; or Accomplished Gentlewoman's Companion and it included several recipes for soups and bisques. A 1772 cookbook, The Frugal Housewife, contained an entire chapter on the topic. English cooking dominated early colonial cooking; but as new immigrants arrived from other countries, other national soups gained popularity. In particular, German immigrants living in Pennsylvania were famous for their potato soups. In 1794, Jean Baptiste Gilbert Payplat dis Julien, a refugee from the French Revolution, opened an eating establishment in Boston called Restorator, and became known as "The Prince of Soups." The first American cookingpamphlet dedicated to soup recipes was written in 1882 by Emma Ewing: Soups and Soup Making.

Portable soup was devised in the 18th century by boiling seasoned meat until a thick, resinous syrup was left that could be dried and stored for months at a time. The Japanese miso is an example of a concentrated soup paste.