Soup Diary 110301

Up until just a few years ago I would have listed Cream of Mushroom soup as one of the last things I'd ever want to eat. I can't really explain why, since I generally didn't mind mushrooms in other things, like pizza. There was just something unappealing about the concept of cream of mushroom soup-- maybe that it seemed to be all about the mushrooms, without any supporting flavors involved (unlike, say, pizza). But I finally broke down-- I think it was after I'd had some Hungarian mushroom soup that actually did involve a bunch of other vegetables. So when I was confronted with the option of Cream of Mushroom at a recent restaurant visit, I went with it. It wasn't bad, but it really did seem to rely too heavily on the one ingredient. I'm not sure that there's any way to fix that, since the whole concept seems to be to emphasize the mushroom. Maybe if it had used portobello mushrooms I'd be more impressed. But now after trying this a couple of times, I doubt I'll ever have it again.