Minestrone soup is a light but filling dinner, the ultimate comfort food with tomato broth and beans. Change up the veggies depending on what you have at home and what’s in season, the result will always be delightful.
Minestrone soup is a staple recipe of my family. My mum made it every evening when I was a child, and I couldn’t hate it more.
Chunks of stewed vegetables with chewy beans in a boiling broth, bleh! I begged my parents to cook something different, pasta, risotto, or even pizza, but minestrone was on the table, every evening without fail.
Sometimes I went on strike and refused to eat it, ‘I rather go to bed without dinner, than eat minestrone AGAIN’.
Life plays in mysterious ways and many years later, far away from family, I find myself longing for that very same minestrone soup. I dreamt of the seasonal vegetables brought together with the delicious broth and the flavoursome beans adding texture to the soup.
I went to all supermarkets but couldn’t find anything that recalled a real minestrone soup. In Italy, you’ll find a perfectly cooked minestrone soup in any supermarket freezer aisle. Minestrone is not only my family’s favourite meal but a very common Italian dinner. Testament to that is that my mum still can’t believe this doesn’t exist abroad. She still thinks it’s me finding an excuse to not eat it hehe!
When I want to eat something, there’s nothing that holds me back. I bought lots of seasonal fresh vegetables, happily diced them all, and mixed them with seasoning till the soup’s flavour reminded me of home.
It took me around one hour to clean and chop the veggies, but it was such a mindful and pleasing activity that I didn’t mind. I made three batches, one for today and two more to freeze for later. Half an hour after the soup started to boil, I added two spoons of tomato paste, salt and pepper to taste, and a generous amount of cannellini beans. As I simmered the soup and waited twenty more minutes, I felt such a grown-up. So responsible and so mature – never mind I keep forgetting my keys at home, my laundry got all pink, and I keep postponing life admin for later: I made minestrone soup from scratch, check me out!
Making minestrone soup is now a life habit. I make three batches once a month, and so grateful for my soup in the freezer after a long day at work. Riccardo and I have a tried and tested assembly line and we dice the veggies in no time.
I feel so happy now eating minestrone for dinner. This soup is packed with goodness, and it always fixes me up.
I smile at myself as I scrap the bowl: we spend a lifetime proclaiming our independence from our parents, how different we are, to then find a bit of them in us as we grow up.
I know my relationship with minestrone didn’t start with the right foot, but I will now swear by it. I now look at my parents with different eyes thinking of all their effort to serve this soup every evening. You understand certain things only on the other side.
Minestrone is a soup made with love, the veggies change with the season, but its comfort is a constant.
Cuddle up under a blanket and enjoy a minestrone soup with your dear ones tonight.
Minestrone Soup
Course: MainsDifficulty: Easy45
minutes50
minutesMinestrone soup is a light but filling dinner, the ultimate comfort food with tomato broth and beans. Change up the veggies depending on what you have at home and what’s in season, the result will always be delightful.
This recipe makes for 1.8 kg of soup, around 6 big portions.
Ingredients
- The veggies
150 g onions (one small onion/half of a big one)
200 g celery (3 stalks)
250 g carrots (around 2 carrots)
200 g butternut squash (around a third of butternut squash)
200 g courgette (one courgette)
120 g leeks (one leek)
250 g savoy cabbage (a third of cabbage)
150 g potatoes (1 small potato)
100 g spinaches
50 g peas
150 g green beans
- Seasoning and cooking
2 tbsp tomato paste
1/2 tbsp sea salt
1.5 liter of water
1 bay leaf
400 g cannellini or borlotti beans
30 g parsley
Method
- Finely chop all the ingredients and add them to one single pot.
- Pour 1 liter of water and add the seasoning. Let the soup simmer for 20 minutes at least.
- Add a can of cannellini or borlotti beans and cook for another 30 minutes.
- Serve hot with bread and parsley.
Notes
- Minestrone requires a large variety of vegetables. It is an incredibly versatile dish and you can use any kind of vegetables depending on the season and what you have left in the fridge. For example, you can also use broccoli and cauliflower (personal note: I hate cauliflower in minestrone as they have an overpowering taste, but hey! You might love it so give it a try).
- As you might have noticed, we are only using a third of a big vegetable (cabbage, butternut squash, celery, etc.). I actually use all the vegetables and divide the minestrone into three big batches of 1.8kg each. It’d be a waste to only use half or less of the ingredients and leave the rest of the vegetables hanging, forgotten in the fridge. Plus, it takes a lot of time to dice all the veggies. While I am at it, I do a bit more for a later meal. I usually cook one batch and freeze the other two uncooked. It’s a perfect healthy winter quick dinner, so handy to have it ready in the freezer. Top tip: do not add any of the ingredients under the section ‘Seasoning and cooking’ to the batches of soup you freeze. You can directly cook the frozen batch (i.e. no unfreezing is required) with 1.5 boiling water from the kettle plus seasoning.
This is such a great recipe and an idea to freeze precut veggies for a quick batch of soup next time! If I freeze the veggies, is it okay to then cook them all at once, or separating them for an optimal different cooking time will be required? Thank you for your answer 🙂
Hi dear Inga, yes absolutely! Freeze all the veggies together and cook them at the same time – it’s a very no fuss recipe. I normally transfer all the frozen veggies to a pot and pour boiling water over them directly from the kettle. I add some salt and a spoon of tomato paste and cook them from frozen for around 30 minutes. I then add a can of beans, stir for 5 more mins and done…dinner is ready! If you are in a rush, 20 minutes will be enough but if you have time, you can cook the soup for up to one hour and a half. I hope this helps, a big hug!