The Dish: Bowls of Chilly
A local soup shop ventures beyond gazpacho to beat the summer heat.
Summer soups tend to get short shrift. On most menus, the only cool, seasonal option you’ll find—if any at all—is the ubiquitous bowl of gazpacho. This summer the New England Soup Factory offers about a dozen takes on the chilled soup, from avocado, cucumber, and lime to sweet-potato vichyssoise to the wickedly decadent chocolate-cherry with coconut.
The best: a creamy mango-lime, with an intense, refreshing citrus kick that cuts through the sweetness, and Hungarian cherry, which tastes pleasingly like melted sherbet. To make a meal of it, the shop assembles picnic spreads that include your pick of potages, plus salads, sandwiches, and desserts. And yes, if you insist, they do have gazpacho.
Tanglewood picnic for two, including soup, salads, fruit cups, and cookies, $43.95; 2–4 Brookline Pl., Brookline, 617-739-1695; 244 Needham St., Newton, 617-558-9966; newenglandsoupfactory.com.