Soup

To make the prep easier, buy pre-sliced meat and vegetables; they're sold at some Asian markets. If you can't find pre-sliced meat, ask your butcher to slice it for you. Improv: Substitute bok choy for the cabbage, and onions for the leeks.

Tender pieces of short rib and barley add body to a delicate herbal broth you can make ahead and enjoy for days.

Each spoonful of this French country-style soup delivers the warming taste of sun-ripened tomatoes and luxurious saffron.

It's hard to believe there's no cream in this soup, it's so velvety. A swirl of minty pistou, added at the last minute, provides complexity.

Look for ancho chile powder in the spice section of supermarkets.

Lentils are a very ancient food staple, and have been the basis of diets in the Middle East for millennia. To perk up the flavor of this soup, cooks often add a spritz of lemon juice to each serving at the last minute.

Minestra di farro
Puréed-bean soups can sometimes be monotonous, but here farro's seductively chewy texture is anything but boring. This recipe has the comforting appeal of pasta e fagioli. Farro is available from Far Away Foods (farawayfoods.com).

For easy serving, ladle the soup into pretty bowls, and set them on the buffet table.

Serve this creamy, chilled soup as a refreshing first course.

With authentic Asian flavor, this soup is a perfect light supper.

This light chowder with a subtle note of smokiness really lets the scallops shine.

Gael Greene shared these recipes with Epicurious from her new book, Insatiable. On a writing retreat at the cabin of screenwriter Vicki Polon, we put together this fragrant soup.