National Vichyssoise Day – November 18, 2024

History of National Vichyssoise Day

In 19th-century France, soup recipes made using pureed leeks and potatoes were common. French cookbooks from those times called these soups ‘Potage Parmentier’ or ‘Potage à la Parmentier’ named after the French nutritionist and scholar Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, who helped pioneer the use of potatoes in 18th century France. These soup recipes were similar to the Vichyssoise soup.

Culinary historians haven’t been able to pinpoint one clear origin of this soup. One narrative of its history dates back to King Louis XV of France who, in his fear of being poisoned, asked his servants to taste a potato leek soup he had been served, and by the time he started eating it, it had gone cold. Julia Child offered another narrative and called it “an American invention.” Her version claims that in 1917, a French chef at the Ritz-Carlton in New York City called Louis Diat, who grew up in a small town called Vichy in France, adapted his mother and grandmother’s potato and leek soup recipe, which led to the birth of Vichyssoise. Diat’s interview in 1950 in the “New Yorker” magazine confirmed this story.

The New Yorker article also mentioned that the soup derived its name from the town, Vichy, and was called ‘Crème Vichyssoise Glacée.’ A hot version of the same soup prepared by the French chef Jules Gouffé also existed in a cookbook in 1869.