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"Do you have a kinder, more adaptable friend in the food world than soup? Who soothes you when you are ill? Who warms you in the winter and cools you in the summer? Yet who also is capable of doing honor to your richest table and impressing your most demanding guests? You don't catch steak hanging around when you're poor and sick, do you?"
Judith Martin, (Miss Manners)
Each day I drive into Geneva from my farmhouse in rural France to bring my children to school and then I return home. And again at 3 pm I repeat the run. It's a beautiful drive and each season paints new surprises onto the landscape. But the best part of the drive home is that with 
each kilometer travelled, I step further back into history. I weave my way through Veyrier, Switzerland with its decorated harpoons from the Ice Age and historic Jewish cemetery that straddles two countries, and cross the border into Collonge-Sous-Saleve, France, a village created during the Middle Ages, and the location of the composer Giuseppe Verdi's secret marriage in 1859. Then on through St. Julien-en-Genevois, established in 1603 and a transit point for Jews escaping Nazi occupied France during the second world war, past the majestic 15th century chateau of Count Justin de Viry, catch a glimpse of Fort l'Ecluse, a military outpost in Roman Gaul commissioned by Julius Caesar in 58 BC, and then home. My home is new by these standards, only 200 years old, but we do sit on a Roman aqueduct which still produces the sweetest drinking water we've ever tasted. It is from this vantage point that my adventures in the kitchen begin.
It all started three years ago when my neighbour Yvonne came over to bring me some vegetables from her garden. A giant carrot, perfect zucchini and some tomatoes just picked from her plants. It was getting to the end of the summer and she had had enough. She had picked and eaten, pickled, and frozen all she could but her garden was still producing more. Out of this act of generosity, an artisanal soup business was born. The more I cooked, the more I asked. The more I asked, the more I learned. The more I learned, the more I wanted to share. So I cooked, and asked and learned, and it became clear that food cannot be separated from its history and the place it plays within the culture where it is created. Grab a cup of coffee and join me as we travel through history, one amazing dish at at time.
On this site I hope to bring you along with me on this adventure of discovery in the kitchens and farms in Haute Savoie, France and beyond. Welcome to The Adaptable Friend.