Our common nature is a musical journey with Yo-Yo Ma and me, Ana Gonzalez, through this complicated country.

We go into caves, onto boats, and up mountain trails to meet people, hear their stories, their poetry, and of course, play some music, all to reconnect to nature, and get closer to the things we're missing.

Listen to Our Common Nature from WNYC, wherever you get podcasts.

Hey, it's Frances Lamb, and this is Splendid Table Select, our mini podcast on the stuff that makes us better cooks and eaters.

The holidays came and went. The new year started a couple weeks ago, and now it's just winter.

For two-thirds of the country or so, anyway, it's cold and dark and you've probably

got a stuffy nose. But do not despair, because we have something today that will cure all that

ails you. It's a soup, a soup that people obsess over, including our producer, Sally Swift.

Have a listen to a conversation with the food writer Anna Thomas about her beloved green soup.

Hi Anna. Thanks for joining us. Hey, thank you for having me. It's great to be here.

So I was very intrigued by an article that you wrote on green soups. Can you tell me what the story

behind them are? Well, you know, I've been making these green soups, and there are a number of them.

It's a whole category of soup.

And I've been making them for years and years now, but I remember when it really got started for me.

And it's when I had this little house up in Idlewild in the mountains.

And my son was going to school there, and we used to go up there,

and cold, cold in the winter up in the mountains. And it was one of those gray, cold days,

not one of those beautiful winter days, but one of those damp, awful winter days, and the holidays were over,

and my jeans were tight because I'd eaten too many cookies and, you know, I just felt,

ugh, I needed to do something. And thank God, I had been to the farmer's market and I had all

these greens in the refrigerator. So I did the thing that every Polish cook does. I started

cutting up onions. I mean, that's how you start, everything, right? And I started cutting up onions and sauteing them and caramelizing them, and I started washing my greens, and I thought this is going to be a soup. And I made a soup out of, it was probably kale and charred and maybe spinach. Maybe it was the triple crown, my favorite, you know, combination.

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