Purée de Tomates, otherwise Portugaise

Purée de Tomates, otherwise Portugaise (a silken tomato purée soup), teaches liaison au riz, thickening with rice rather than flour. The rice cooks until it disappears into the tomato, then the sieve turns that humble body into velvet. Know one thing before you touch the pan: the finishing butter belongs away from the fire, where it can emulsify into gloss instead of melting into grease.

The original set a saucier beside a stockpot of white consommé and sent the finished soup through a tammy. At home, a sturdy fine-mesh sieve takes the tammy's place, and clean, unsalted light chicken stock may stand in for clarified consommé because its clarity disappears inside tomato and rice. Clarifying stock and holding several pans through service were brigade scaffolding, so they go. The rice liaison, the sieve, the separate rice-and-tomato garnish, and the off-heat butter are the dish, so they stay. The batch comes to about two quarts: one cook, one stove, one evening.

The finished Portugaise should pour in a broad coral-red ribbon, glossy but not heavy, with separate grains of rice and bright butter-tossed tomato interrupting the smoothness. The single step that decides it is the last one: take the pan fully from the heat before the butter goes in.