Bread bowl

Bread bowl

A porcini mushroom (darker elements) and noodle soup served in a bread bowl
Type	Bread
Main ingredients	Bread

A bread bowl is a round loaf of bread which has had a large portion of the middle cut out to create an edible bowl. They are typically larger than a roll but smaller than a full sized loaf of bread. Bread bowls can be used to serve chili, New England-style clam chowder, and other thick stews (often, but not always, with a cheese or cream base). Soups with thinner bases are not generally served in bread bowls, as the broth would make the bread get too soggy too quickly. The bread becomes flavored as it absorbs some of the stew's base, and can be eaten after the stew has been eaten.

Meals served in bread bowls can be found at some restaurants, such as the Canadian coffee chain Tim Hortons, Boudin Bakery, Panera Bread, Hearth 'n Kettle, Quizno's, Au Bon Pain, Domino's Pizza, and vendors at some Renaissance faires. It is also good to use for dips, using the scooped out bread for dipping.

Use of a bread bowl can add considerably to a soup's calorie count. Calorie counts posted at Au Bon Pain, for example, state that the bread bowl contains 620 calories in addition to those in the soup itself.

Bread bowls are little known in the United Kingdom; in 2008 The Daily Telegraph reported that a company in Birmingham was making a naan bread version.