Recipe: Minestrone Soup

"Minestrone originally was a very humble dish and was intended for everyday consumption, being filling and cheap, and would likely have been the main course of a meal."

Joe's home-made minestrone soup

Yesterday, we lunched at a Japanese restaurant in Plaza Singapura. The set meal each, which cost approx. S$15 each, was value for money. In particular, mine came with two huge bowls of rice - one topped with raw salmon, and the other with egg and unagi (grilled eel), accompanied with soft-shell crab tempura plus the steamed egg and miso soup.

After the heavy lunch, we both wanted something light and simple for dinner. So, we decided on bread and soup. After further discussion, we agreed to make sardine sandwiches and minestrone soup. Below is the recipe for the minestrone soup.

step 1: dicing vegetables.

1. Dice coarsely the vegetables - in our case, we used 5 stalks of celery, 1 huge carrot, 3 tomatoes, 2 small onions, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 corn. Feel free to add different vegetables. Traditionally, the recipe include courgettes and potato.

step 2: cooking and stirring vegetables

2. Heat olive oil in a large saucepan over moderate heat. Add onions and garlic; cook & stir 6-8 minutes until onions are soft. Stir in the carrotrs, celery, and tomatoes and stir 5 minutes. Stir in the corn kernels; and stir for 3 minutes.

step 3. Simmering the soup.

3. Add stock to saucepan. To enhance the flavor, you can add salt, basil, rosemary, pepper and bay leaf. In my case, I added 1/4 cup of red wine and two fresh scallops. Bring to boil over high heat; reduce heat to low. Cover and simmer for 1 1/2 hours.

4. Add pasta to the saucepan (note: the minestrone soup we ate in Italy had cannellini beans, which if you are using, could be added at this point in time). Uncover and cook over moderately low heat for a further 30-40 minutes until soup thickens, stirring occasionally.

5. Serve with parmesan cheese, if using.

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Minestrone is one of the cornerstones of Italian cuisine. It is part of what is known in Italy as cucina povera (literally "poor kitchen") meaning poorer people's cuisine. There is no set recipe for minestrone since it is usually made out of whatever vegetables are in season. Common ingredients include beans, onions, celery, carrots, stock, tomatoes, and often with the addition of pasta or rice (source: wikipedia).