You Can Take the Boy Out of the Peanut . . .

This is one of our absolute favorites coming out of our soul food kitchen in Tel Aviv: Peanut Soup. I know, I know, I just posted a piece about the 17 kilo bucket of tahini I bought in the market, talking about making adaptations to Israeli tastes. I lied.

Well, I didn’t so much lie as start to feel a sense of betrayal at migrating away from one of my seminal foods growing up. If anyone were to do a swab analysis of my many-stained tee shirts I had as a kid, they would see a kid who lived on a diet of peanut butter and mustard. Not together, mind you, although that’s starting to give me ideas. But I digress.

Peanut butter was simply nurse’s milk to me. Or still as. Give me the chance, and I can sneak it in to most anything. A pasta sauce? Child’s play. A steak marinade? Also obvious. Peanut butter hummus? On our menu. And this vegan soup of the week, peanut soup, that starts out conventionally enough (onion, and celery sauteed in a bit of butter, throw in fresh diced tomatoes) and then goes all southern catterwumpy on you.

My Aunt Millie, who passed away this week at the age of 90, a kinda second mom to me, loved the taste of peanuts, even though she felt it would mess with her stylish figure. She cheated on herself all the time though. In honor of Millie, we will be cooking up a swath of peanut-inspired dishes this week. Because life really is too short.