By Martine Thompson, The New York Times
In August 2025, Jennifer Ying, 26, posted a video on TikTok for a Chinese ginger-scallion chicken soup that she grew up eating. Within five days, it racked up more than 1 million views and she made it the first of a series showcasing how to prepare soup for breakfast.
In the comments on the videos from Ying, a home cook based in Seattle, viewers shared the soups they grew up with — including breakfasts like Colombian changua and Filipino tinola — creating a kind of informal archive of soup rituals that predate the internet.
For Ying and others, food nourishes the connection to family heritage, especially when distance or language complicate that relationship. For generations, broths and creamy soups have offered low-effort, high-reward comfort in the morning, when the body wants warmth before anything else. Cooked in a single pot with just a few ingredients, these simple breakfast soups are endlessly adaptable to mood and palate.
Sonoko Sakai, a Los Angeles-based cooking teacher and the author of “Wafu Cooking: Everyday Recipes with Japanese Style,” has maintained the ritual of breakfast soup since childhood, when her mother always kept soup on the stove to easily and economically feed five children. A growing number of home cooks are adopting the same practice as it trends online.
Dallas Miranda Klein, 29, began starting her mornings with breakfast soup after seeing traditional Chinese medicine practices online. A lifestyle influencer based in San Tan Valley, Arizona, she typically had only an energy drink for breakfast, but now cooks big batches of broth with tofu, pork-and-shrimp meatballs and vegetables to last for several days.
“With energy drinks, I’d get energy, but I’d also feel a little frazzled,” she said. “Having soup in the morning feels calmer and like soothing the body.”
Irishcel Puello, who goes by Iris Beilin professionally, is a California-based content creator who typically prepares dishes from her Panamanian heritage for lunch and dinner, but long enjoyed a cold protein shake in the mornings. After seeing a video titled “Eat Your Skincare” on TikTok by Abby Sigua, Puello switched to miso soup for her morning routine. In the process, she learned more about the practice from Japanese home cooks online as well.
“Girl, it changed my life,” Puello said. For the past six months, she has started her day with miso soup made with bone broth, tofu, dashi and seaweed. About half an hour later, she eats a heartier breakfast. “The warm broth feels gentle,” she said. “Itap like a hug every morning.”
Beyond social media, breakfast soup can be found at restaurants. On weekend mornings in East Williamsburg, a neighborhood in Brooklyn, bowls of changua arrive steaming at Palenque, a Colombian restaurant where the milk-based soup is a brunch mainstay. Luz Angela Sierra, the founder and owner who goes by Nena, grew up eating changua in Bogotá. “It fills your soul when you eat it,” she said.
Changua, made with milk, water, eggs, scallions and cilantro, is offered at Palenque in both a milk version and an oat milk alternative for dairy-averse diners. Sierra also updates the topping: Instead of using calado, a hard bread typically eaten alongside or in the soup, she opts for pan de bono, a Colombian cheese bread toasted until crisp.
Another breakfast soup favorite at Palenque? A go-to hangover remedy of caldo de costilla, a beef short rib and potato broth with cilantro rice and spicy ají.
Itap as satisfying to make soup at home as it is to sip it at a restaurant. Sakai, now 71, dedicates Sundays to making quarts of homemade dashi, or broth, for her household of two, keeping them on standby for breakfast and other meals. Dashi doesn’t have to be complicated to be delicious.
“If you cook potatoes, onions or cabbage, they all give you dashi,” she said, “They give you flavor without an artificial bouillon.” She notes that a bit of chicken or duck fat can enhance it and adding umami with bonito flakes is “magic.”
“A layer of umami just excites your appetite and gets your morning going,” she said. “Itap better than coffee.”
Recipe: Changua (Savory Breakfast Soup)
Changua is a nourishing Colombian breakfast soup thatap traditionally made with milk, water and eggs, plus scallions and cilantro that flavor the broth as it simmers. The dish comes from Colombia’s central Andes region — particularly Boyacá and Cundinamarca, including the capital, Bogotá — where itap a familiar breakfast. At Palenque, a Brooklyn restaurant devoted to Colombian home cooking, changua arrives without embellishment, made either with dairy or, more unexpectedly, with oat milk. The plant-based version doesn’t try to mimic the original so much as reinterpret it: The oat milk brings a mild sweetness and roundness that works well with the scallions and cilantro. Bite-size pieces of toasted pan de bono, a popular Colombian cheese bread typically made with yuca flour, eggs, cheese, butter and sometimes salt or sugar, soften gradually in the broth. If you can’t find cheese bread, any rustic bread will work. A bowl of changua is meant to steady you in the morning, whether you’re easing into the day, recovering from the night before, or lingering somewhere in between.
Recipe from Luz Angela “Nena” Sierra
Adapted by Martine Thompson
Yield: 1 serving
Total time: 20 minutes
Ingredients
- 2 small pan de bono (about 2 1/2 ounces each; see Tip), firm cheese bread, or day-old baguette, country loaf or ciabatta, cut into bite-size pieces (1 1/2 to 2 cups)
- 2 scallions, finely chopped
- 2 packed tablespoons cilantro leaves, finely chopped, plus more for garnish
- Salt and black pepper
- 1/2 cup milk (or oat milk, which yields slightly sweeter and lighter results)
- 2 eggs
Preparation
1. Toast the pan de bono pieces until golden and crisp using a toaster oven, a 350-degree oven or a waffle iron.
2. Meanwhile, pour 1 cup water into a small saucepan. Add the scallions and cilantro, and season with a pinch each of salt and pepper. Turn the heat to medium-high and bring the mixture to a gentle boil.
3. Add the milk and let the liquid return to a gentle boil, then reduce the heat to medium so it stays at a steady simmer. (You should spot small bubbles around the edges, rather than rapidly boiling bubbles at the center.) Season to taste again with salt and pepper.
4. Crack each egg into a small bowl, then gently release them into the simmering liquid. Let them cook until the egg whites are completely white and firm but the yolks are still soft, 2 to 5 minutes, depending on your preference.
5. Transfer the soup and eggs to a bowl and scatter the toasted pan de bono pieces on top, allowing them to soften slightly in the broth. As an optional final touch, add a bit more chopped cilantro on top. Serve immediately.
Tips
Firm pan de bono doesn’t fall apart in the soup. If you can’t find it, use a bread like day-old, stale baguette, country loaf or ciabatta that feels firm and dry. Avoid very soft breads, which can turn mushy in the soup.
This article originally appeared in .
