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Soup Joumou

Name: Soup Joumou
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 70 min
Total time: 95 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Haitian
Ingredients: 500 g Beef chuck, cubed; 1.5 l Beef stock; 500 g Calabaza squash (joumou); 150 g Carrot; 200 g Potatoes; 150 g Turnip; 150 g White cabbage; 150 g Onion; 30 g Spring onions; 5 cloves Garlic cloves; 1 piece Scotch bonnet pepper; 4 sprigs Fresh thyme sprigs; 150 g Macaroni; 10 g Flat-leaf parsley; 30 ml Lime juice; 10 g Fine sea salt; 3 g Ground black pepper

A hearty beef and squash soup, thickened until the squash nearly dissolves into the broth, loaded with root vegetables and small pasta — Haiti's dish of independence, eaten every New Year's Day.

Prep: 25 min
Cook: 70 min
Difficulty: Intermediate

About this dish

Under French colonial rule, joumou soup — rich with squash, a delicacy — was reserved for enslavers; enslaved Haitians were forbidden to eat it. When Haiti won its independence on 1 January 1804, becoming the first nation founded by a successful slave revolt, the newly free population began the tradition of cooking and eating soup joumou that very day, and it's been the ritual centrepiece of every Haitian New Year since. UNESCO added it to its list of intangible cultural heritage in 2021, recognising a bowl of soup as an act of remembered liberation as much as a meal.

Lactose-free
Not vegetarian because of Beef chuck, cubed, Beef stock
Contains gluten because of Macaroni

Ingredients

4servings

500gBeef chuck, cubed
1 ½lBeef stock
500gCalabaza squash (joumou)
150gCarrot
200gPotatoes
150gTurnip
150gWhite cabbage
150gOnion
30gSpring onions
5clovesGarlic cloves
1pieceScotch bonnet pepper
4sprigsFresh thyme sprigs
150gMacaroni
10gFlat-leaf parsley
30mlLime juice
10gFine sea salt
3gGround black pepper

Instructions

Rub the beef with lime juice, crushed garlic and salt, and let it sit 15 minutes to clean and season the meat.
10 min
Tip: This lime rub is a genuine Haitian kitchen habit, not decoration — it's believed to remove any gamey edge from the meat before it ever touches the pot.
Brown the beef, then add the stock, chopped squash, onion, whole scotch bonnet and thyme, bring to a boil and simmer 40 minutes until the beef is tender and the squash has mostly broken down.
40 min
Tip: Keep the scotch bonnet whole and unpierced — it flavours the broth with heat and fruitiness without turning the soup fiercely spicy, and you fish it out before serving.
Blend or mash some of the softened squash back into the broth to thicken it, then add the carrot, potatoes, turnip, cabbage and green onion and simmer 15 minutes until tender.
15 min
Tip: Mashing only part of the squash, not all of it, gives the soup its characteristic body while still leaving some vegetables whole and identifiable in the bowl.
Add the macaroni and cook until just tender, about 5 minutes, then stir in the parsley and black pepper before serving.
5 min
Tip: Small pasta shapes cook fast in a hot broth — add them too early and they turn to mush by the time everything else is ready.