This is my recipe for what I call “minestrone”, even though I suspect purists would take issue with it.
- 1 cup dry white beans (eg cannelini, navy beans, etc)
- 1 onion, diced
- 3-4 rashers bacon, cut into thin slices or diced
- slosh of olive oil
- 3+ cloves garlic, minced
- beef stock
- 1 large tin crushed tomatoes
- soup vegies (today I used celery and carrot, but just about anything’s good), diced
- seasonings – pepper, salt, oregano, whatever else takes your fancy
- 1 cup small pasta eg. macaroni
- 1 bunch cooking greens eg. kale (US) or silver beet (AU), roughly chopped
Soak beans overnight, simmer them for an hour, or otherwise do whatever you can to get them to a state of not being tooth-breaking little pebbles. They don’t need to be totally cooked through, though.
Oil, onion, and bacon go in the pan. Saute til onion is transparent and everything smells very good. Add the garlic, and stir around a bit more. Add carrots, celery, and any other vegies of that nature and keep cooking and stirring til everything has a glazed, cooked-ish sort of look to it. Then throw in the stock and tomatoes along with the beans (strained). The amoung of stock you need, or perhaps just some added water, will depend on how many vegies you had and how thick the soup appears. Just add what seems sensible and soup-like. Simmer for an hour or two, til the beans are nice and soft. There’s no harm in leaving the soup on the stove for ages at this point.
Just before serving, throw in the pasta and greens. Cook for another 10 minutes then serve.
I made this on the weekend and we’re still eating the leftovers. It thickens up as it sits in the fridge, so it’s almost a stew at this point. I’ll be taking a serve of it to eat after the gym tomorrow.
