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Beloved Kelowna soup and sandwich shop offers new tasting experience

Cajun Gumbo soup is one of over 300 varieties of soup offered on a rotating menu at Little Hobo Soup and Sandwich Shop in Kelowna.
Cajun Gumbo soup is one of over 300 varieties of soup offered on a rotating menu at Little Hobo Soup and Sandwich Shop in Kelowna.
Image Credit: SUBMITTED/ Crystal Dugan

A popular soup and sandwich restaurant in Kelowna is offering something fun, delicious and innovative, and soup lovers might want to check it out.

The Little Hobo Soup and Sandwich Shop in downtown Kelowna recently added soup flights to its menu. Just like with beer, wine and cocktail flights, Little Hobo’s soup flights come with three different tasty options to indulge in at one sitting.

“My head chef is a woodworker and I asked him to make soup flights,” shop co-owner Crystal Dugan said. “We’re also beer fans and thought why can’t we do flights with soups too?"

While the shop on Leon Avenue also serves a wide variety of home cooked dishes, sandwiches and salads, soup has always been at the heart of the menu since Dugan purchased the shop 12 years ago.

“Soup is the best meal in my opinion,” she said. “You can make any meal into a soup, get creative and have all the nutrients you need in one bowl. It’s tasty, economical and fills you up for hours.”

When Dugan first started she could make four different kinds of soups, but now creates over 300 kinds from scratch for a menu that rotates throughout the year. She said she was able to expand her soup menu through a lot of work, trial and error and customer feedback. 

Every day there are four soup options to choose from including vegan, vegetarian and meat-based options. Customers can now choose three options for a soup flight that comes with a homemade biscuit for dipping.

So far customer feedback has been positive.

“People are loving it, it’s so much fun having a taste of everything,” Dugan said.

Owner at Little Hobo Soup and Sandwich Shop, Crystal Dugan holds a soup flight with lasagna soup, French onion soup and Doukhobor borscht.
Owner at Little Hobo Soup and Sandwich Shop, Crystal Dugan holds a soup flight with lasagna soup, French onion soup and Doukhobor borscht.
Image Credit: SUBMITTED/Crystal Dugan

She isn’t clear whether or not the idea will catch on to other restaurants.

“I recommend it, why not have other restaurants share in the joy?” she said. “It does require having someone making three or four soups every day so it won't work for everyone." 

When asked which soups are the biggest fan favourites, Dugan couldn’t decide, but said her personal favourite is the Doukhobor borscht that is made from a recipe from the Grand Forks area and is bubbling on the stove every Friday.

READ MORE: Drastic changes needed as Okanagan wine industry faces 'existential crisis'

While the shop has full-sized soups for pickup and frozen soups for sale at a variety of local grocery stores, the flights are only available during seated dining hours from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday at the 596 Leon Ave location.

Go here for more information and to see what’s on the menu.


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