Soup Sunday chief is a slurp vet

Soup Sunday chairman Hannah Vogler and VIP chef Tim Morton stir up some soup in the kitchen at Cache.
Soup Sunday chairman Hannah Vogler and VIP chef Tim Morton stir up some soup in the kitchen at Cache.

Hannah Vogler and Soup Sunday have kind of grown up together. She has firm and fond memories of attending the early incarnations of the Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families' fundraiser at Cajun's Wharf.

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VIP chef Tim Morton and Hannah Vogler show off their muffin-tin technique for maximizing the number of Soup Sunday samples they can acquire.

"I remember busting in line to get my favorite," she says. "I used to go straight to Andre's table for the soup and the rolls."

Chef Andre Simon has since died, so there's no longer an Andre's table at Soup Sunday, which is no longer at Cajun's Wharf. This year's event, from 4 to 7 p.m. Jan. 31, will, for the second year, take place at the Statehouse Convention Center after several years at Cajun's and a lot more years at west Little Rock's Embassy Suites Hotel, both of which it outgrew.

This is Vogler's first year as chairman of Arkansas Advocates' Soup Sunday Committee, but "I've been on the committee I honestly don't know how long." She spent five years in New York in the early part of this century, moving back to Arkansas in 2007, "and I've been involved since '08."

Vogler says she has been impressed with the recent growth and increasing quality of the Little Rock food scene. While acknowledging that Little Rock doesn't have quite the breadth or depth of the Big Apple, "The food in Little Rock is on par with the best food I've eaten in New York."

Soup Sunday patrons will get a chance to test that, as three dozen restaurants, caterers and food providers put forward samples of soup, bread and gourmet desserts. Tickets are $25 in advance, at aradvocates.org/events/little-rock-soup-sunday-2016 ($30 after 5 p.m. Friday), $10 for children 5-17, free for children younger than 5. Call (501) 371-9678.

The event will also include silent and live auctions (with Craig O'Neill as auctioneer), a kids' area and music by the Big John Miller Band. Proceeds support the nonprofit's mission "to ensure that all Arkansas children and their families have the resources and opportunities to lead healthy and productive lives."

A $50 VIP ticket will get you access to all the soups on the main floor, plus entry into the VIP room, where there will be a beer-and-wine bar and VIP chef Tim Morton, formerly of 1620 and now at Cache, will be serving up specialty soups. (He says he'll dish up a savory sweet potato-cilantro, a lobster bisque and "something that reflects the Southern United States.") Morton will also be up on a riser where he can talk with patrons and do cooking demonstrations.

The event has continued to grow, outgrowing the hotel space it used to occupy. Vogler expects this year to break last year's attendance figure of 1,600, and for that, "we need a very large space."

About two dozen of the restaurants on the list (which Vogler expects to grow, since many add their ladles at the last minute) will be providing soup; the rest will offer desserts or bread or both.

Soups vary from year to year, even from the same restaurants. "Some come off their menus; some are off-menu specials," Vogler says. "Some of them create a whole new soup just for the occasion."

Her advice for ticket holders new to this scene, "Do not eat before you come. Don't think you can eat all the soups, unless you just get a tiny taste of each; you'll get sick. Some restaurants will run out of soup; it happens every year -- there's no way to know."

And take along a muffin tin, in which you can put at least a half-dozen paper soup cups, the best and easiest way to obtain the samples you want and get them back to a table without dumping them on the floor.

The restaurants benefit through exposure to potential customers; many have representatives on hand to talk about their food offerings with soup-sippers, and pass out menus and coupons.

Vogler and Morton praised the overall generosity of the area's restaurants, who are called upon early, often and sometimes beyond the call of duty to support charitable events.

"Restaurants are truly very charitable," Vogler adds. "So many of them come through. They say 'yes' a lot."

Vogler has been a supporter, and more, for nonprofits for much of her adult life. A former nonprofit consultant, she is director of programs for the Arkansas Rice Depot (in the process of merging with Arkansas Foodbank), and works as the executive director of Argenta Community Development Corp.

As such, she's always popping up at fundraisers, her own and those of others.

"Of all the hundreds of events I've attended, this is the most fun," she says. "You can come in jeans and a T-shirt -- well, maybe a sweatshirt if it's cold. It's a fun, casual, laid-back, everybody-come event."

Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families will hold a similar event, its 15th in Northwest Arkansas, 4-7 p.m. Feb. 28 at the John Q. Hammons Convention Center, 3201 Pinnacle Hills Parkway, Rogers. More than 30 Northwest Arkansas restaurants are expected to participate. Tickets are $10-$50. (Visit the website bit.ly/1KuJOvB)

High Profile on 01/24/2016

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