Lost Soup Recipe
I got a request from Allison about a week ago, she said to me that she is looking for a soup recipe that she had as a child. She has been trying to re create this recipe for over 20 years and has had no luck. This is a very special recipe to her. Well with some trial and error I think I have recovered her lost recipe. I have posted it here and I believe I just might have hit it on the nose.
She says that the soup had no meat and it had green beans instead of white beans. She said the broth was a light, thin, flavorful herbal tomato broth. The soup also had a lot of green beans, pasta tubes and leafy bits in it as well and the smell of licorice
Allison it is probably a minestrone soup because you told me that the soup is a “light, thin, flavorful herbal tomato broth”. So diced fennel and a little ground, toasted fennel seeds are added to get the fennel flavor. Also, chopped fennel fronds, basil and parsley at the end to give the herbal quality to the broth. Spinach, Chard and Kale will be chopped and added for the “leafy bits”. A vegetable broth because you said there was no meat in the soup. Allison if your out there I hope you get this post and please let me know if this is that lost recipe!
You will need:
- 2 quarts homemade vegetable broth (recipe below)
- 1 cup onion
- 1/2 cup carrots
- 1/2 cup celery
- 3 cloves of garlic
- 1.5 cups tomatoes (canned or fresh)
- 1 cup fennel
- 1/2 cup zucchini
- 3 cups leafy greens (spinach, kale and/or chard)
- 3 cups green beans
- 1/2 teaspoon ground fennel seeds toasted
- 3 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 cup small pasta (ditalini, elbows or your favorite)
- 1/2 mixture chopped herbs (fennel fronds, basil and parsley
Directions:
- Chop all the vegetables except the herbs into a size that you enjoy in a soup and add them to the vegetable broth.
- Toast the ground fennel seeds in a dry sauté pan over medium-high heat until fragrant (a few seconds) and add it to the vegetable broth.
- Put the tomato paste into a ladle and put the ladle into the vegetable broth. Use a spoon and stir the paste to dissolve it into the broth.
- Simmer the soup for 45 minutes until all the vegetable are tender.
- In a separate pot, boil the pasta in salted water till done.
- Add the pasta to the soup.
- Right before serving the soup, finely chop the herbs and add the herbs to the soup.
Vegetable Broth
Being this is a very special recipe I recommend making the stock from scratch. This is because, in my experience, commercially produced vegetable stocks tend to be a little too sweet. Below is a very basic, well-balanced vegetable stock that is simple to make.
You will need:
- 2.5 quarts of water
- 1 pound of onions (peeled and rough chopped) 1/2 pound carrots (peeled and rough
- chopped) 1/2 pound celery stalks (rough chopped)
- a few peppercorns
- 1 bay leaf
Directions:
- Simmer all the ingredients together for one hour and then strain. This will yield roughly 2 quarts of broth.
Here are some tips
- Salt and pepper should be added to your personal taste. I don’t recommend amounts of these ingredients. I tend to add a salt and pepper, a little at a time while cooking a dish. So, I add a little at the beginning, middle and if it still needs more then I add it at the end too. This way you will not overdo it with the seasoning.
- The vegetables in the soup can be cut as large or small as you like to create different results. For a home-style version of the soup cut the veggies on the larger size.
- Add a couple of drops of vinegar or lemon juice, right before serving the soup, to brighten the flavors. The flavors in a soup can become muted as it simmers for a long time. This little tip will brighten up the flavors of your soup.
- I cook the pasta separate from the soup so that the pasta will not absorb all of the soup’s broth.
I hope I got this recipe brought back to life for Allison I know how important these memories are. By the way…this soup is so good! It’s a keeper for me!
– Daniel Mancini
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