Hiking season is here and what better way to round off a day spent among friends than with a warming, heartening bowl of traditional soothing soup.  Soup for the soul, to warm your bones and reward your healthy endeavours.

Like many other European regions, the Maltese Islands have a variety of authentic, traditional soups created with seasonal ingredients.  Tasty soup dishes which convey history, tradition, and culture in each sumptuous sip, and which taste delicious.

Dishes such as Kusku (a filling, thick rich soup made from kusksu (a type of pasta), broad beans, and goats’ cheese).  Aljotta is, totally different, this is a strong tasting, fish soup harking back to the times of the famous Knights of St John and is made using small fish or fish heads, cooked with garlic, onion, mint, marjoram, basil – and with lemon and rice added to thicken and flavour. Brodu tal-laħam is a luxuriously tasting meat broth, created by slow cooking beef bones, vegetables, tomato, and onions.

A famous Maltese soup dish, popular throughout the Autumn/Winter is The Soppa tal-Armla, which roughly translates as Widow’s Soup.  The soup’s name originates from the Medieval practice of gifting penniless, widowed women with vegetables and other available produce, which they would use to create the most filling dish possible.  This soup was a staple during poorer times, when humble Gozitans lived on what they could afford to grow in their fields and farms.   As meat was often a treat saved for special occasions.