Fresh pea soup

Sunday night after a weekend in Philadelphia (read: Dalessandro's)​ requires a sort of detox dinner. Bread, salad, and something fresh to make you feel fully human again. Enter fresh peas.

The gold standard for me is a bowl of pea soup I had at Mercer Kitchen ​a year ago. It was perfectly smooth, vibrantly green, and tasted like ten thousand peas had be juiced and reduced to a single bowl. The key here is not to skimp on the peas -- they're delicate and so you need a lot of them to get that really intense spring flavor.

Ingredients​

2 cups leeks, sliced​

​3 cups fresh peas, shelled

3 tbsp butter​

5 cups water​

Fresh herbs for garnish (thyme, mint, tarragon, ​chervil or chives all work)

How to​

Melt the butter in a saucepan and add the leeks, stirring to coat. Allow the leeks to cook for about ​five minutes, by which time they will have significantly reduced. Add the water and bring to a boil. Toss in the peas and allow them to simmer for no more than five minutes. Remove them from the heat and allow to cool to a reasonable temperature, and then puree in batches until smooth. Garnish with herbs and parmesan.