Velvety Winter Squash Soup with Smoky Garlic Custard

One Bite of This Soup Transports Me Back to Julia Child's Vacation Home in France

Some people come back from their travels with photos and refrigerator magnets. After visiting Julia Child's former summer home in the south of France, known as La Pitchoune (The Little Thing), in 2010, I returned with a recipe.

Julia and her husband, Paul, built the small house in 1963, and it was where they spent summers and as much time in between as they could. When Paul fell ill and their friend and neighbor Simone Beck died, Julia sold the house. American Kathie Alex bought it in 1993.

Almost 20 years later, a group of our four friends settled in at La Pitchoune for a week during the off-season. On the terraced property of Bramafan near Plascassier, just north of Cannes, the olive and pomegranate trees were bare. Wintry winds howled. Night fell quickly, cold and dark. We devised the ideal schedule: exploring nearby towns, markets, and cafes still open during the day and cooking dinner at the house at night.

Julia's kitchen remained pretty much as she had always had it, a warm and cozy beacon. Dark green tiles served as a backsplash, butcher block counters sat atop dark wood cabinets, terracotta-tiled floors beneath. Earthenware pitchers held bouquets of wooden spoons. Skillets, knives and kitchen utensils hung from Paul's precise pegboard. A high open shelf along one wall displayed framed mementos and a soup terrine in the shape of a duck fluffing its tail feathers.

The first chilly morning, we bought warm croissants from the baker in Plascassier and brought them back to devour with dark, rich coffee. Thus fortified, we would set off for the day's adventure around twisty lanes bordered by stone walls. We visited the farmers' market in Cannes where vendors sold heirloom pumpkins and squash by the wedge, bundles of garlic just pulled from the soil, local cheeses and milk. And in a patisserie, rows and rows of rainbow macarons beckoned, a decade before their popularity reached us in America.

Afternoons meant lingering lunches. For one particularly memorable one, the chef prepared everything in a wood-fired oven blazing with chestnut wood, charry and delicious. We visited Grasse, smelling the scent of lavender before we even got to the perfume town. Then, on the way back to La Pitchoune, stopping to shop for local wine and a baguette or two. Finally, there was dinner, cooking and enjoying the meal with friends.

Those experiences came together as the ingredients of this soup. Golden and velvety, it brightens and soothes, just what we need when winter sets in. The color of a setting winter sun or glowing embers, this soup tastes like Julia's kitchen feels. A scoop of delicate savory, smoky custard and a sprinkling of grated Parmesan and chopped chives make every spoonful taste like an adventure, just a little bit different from the previous one.