I had a hard time coming up with a name for this soup. It's like no potato soup I've made before — deep, rich, earthy. Creamy and savory. It's the potato version of a particularly wonderful mushroom bisque. Plain old "Potato and Leek Soup" just wasn't going to cut it. The title I chose is long and wordy, but it felt wrong to leave out any of the details ("Leek" and "Caramelized Leek" are two different beasts, you know). <br /> <br />So it all started with the humble potato. Have you ever noticed that the more you cook a potato, the better it gets? <br /> <br />Raw potato. Ick. <br /> <br />Baked potato. Better. Needs stuff on it, in it, all over it. Butter, salt, sour cream, bacon. Stuff. <br /> <br />Hash browns. Pretty good. Better with ketchup. (Don't judge me.) <br /> <br />French fries. Now you're talkin'. <br /> <br />Potato chips. Food of the gods. <br /> <br />Regular potato and leek soup is made by boiling the potatoes, separately in water or in right in the soup stock. It works; it makes a nice soup, comforting and familiar. But I had a beautiful batch of local fingerlings and, on a whim, decided to pan-fry them, whole, slowly, in a shallow butter bath until deep and golden. Meanwhile, in a pot on the next burner, leeks freshly pulled from my winter garden simmered in their own butter bath, steamy and aromatic. <br /> <br />It's moments like this when it's bliss to be a home cook.

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