Home Cooks Online

By guest author, Heather Forsyth.

We had guests for dinner Saturday night, one of whom is a vegetarian, so I had fun creating a meatless menu for the first time in awhile, since I became omnivorous almost a year ago.  We started with asparagus (served with egg, toast crumbs and capers), continued with homemade mushroom ravioli with brown butter sage sauce and roasted beets, then this light but very flavorful version of minestrone soup.  After tongues wagged dry over more wine, we ended with individual chocolate souffles.  Most of this menu is not for quick cooks, but the soup got rave reviews, and mostly cooked itself, so I thought I'd post the recipe to share.  It's a nice seasonal segue soup as it relies on root and canned vegetables, but early spring greens for the pesto.  It makes six servings, but you can make fewer servings at a time by making just as much pesto toast as you need.

Minestrone Soup with Pesto Toast

• 4 T. olive oil
  
• 1/2 onion, chopped
  
• 2 stalks celery, chopped
  
• 2 carrots, chopped
  
• 2 small, red-skinned potatoes, cubed
  
• handful of raw shredded cabbage
  
• 1 15 oz. can small, white beans, rinsed and drained
  
• 1 14 oz. can stewed tomatoes
  
• 1 T. tomato paste
  
• 4-5 c. vegetable broth
  
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
  
• 3 T. fresh parsley, minced
  
• salt and pepper, to taste
  
• 6 slices of coarse crumb bread, about 1/2" thick, toasted
  
• 6 T. Pesto (recipe below)

In a soup pot over medium heat, warm olive oil and add onion, celery and carrots, saute for a few minutes until vegetables begin to relax.  Add potatoes, cabbage, tomatoes, tomato paste, beans, 4 cups of stock and about a teaspoon of salt to the pot.  When it's quite hot, but not boiling, reduce heat, cover and simmer gently until vegetables are just tender (this may take 60-90 minutes depending on your stove).  Add garlic and parsley, additional salt and pepper to taste, and additional vegetable broth, if needed.  You want this soup to be fairly brothy as the toast will soak up some of the broth.  Simmer for about 5 minutes more.  Spread 1 T. pesto on each slice of toasted bread.  Ladle soup into wide bowls, top with pesto toast, and serve.

Pesto:  2 c. bitter greens, packed (I used a mixture of mostly arugula, with some spinach), 6-8 T. olive oil, 1/2 c. toasted walnuts, 6 cloves of roasted garlic, 1/2 c. parmesan.  Place the garlic in their skins in a heavy skillet over medium heat for several minutes until skins begin to brown and cloves soften.  Cool and remove skins.  Place all ingredients and 6 T. of olive oil in food processor and blend.  Check for consistency; if it seems to thick add additional olive oil until it becomes spreadable.  If you don't want to bother roasting the garlic, you can use raw, but I'd use 3 cloves instead of 6, at least to start.