Vegetarian Sabbath Minestrone

Image by Courtesy of Paola Gavin
Minestrone del Sabato (Italy)
This classic minestrone soup comes from Rome’s Jewish community. A good minestrone soup should be thick with vegetables, pasta or rice and never watery. The vegetables can vary according to the season – turnip, leek, cabbage, broad (fava) beans, Swiss chard, or beet greens are all possible additions.
Serves 4
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 celery stalk, diced
1 teaspoon finely chopped oregano
1 carrot, diced
2 medium courgettes (zucchini), diced
1 medium potato, peeled and diced
100g (2/3 cup) cooked and drained cannellini beans
100g (2/3 cup) freshly shelled or frozen peas
400g (14oz) ripe plum tomatoes, peeled and chopped
250g (9oz) spinach, cut into 2cm (3/4 in) strips
50g (1/2 cup) spaghetti or vermicelli, broken into 2cm (3/4 in) lengths
salt and freshly ground black pepper
freshly grated pecorino or parmesan cheese
Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan and cook the onion, garlic, celery and oregano over a moderate heat for 2 minutes. Add the carrot, courgettes, potato, cannellini beans, peas, tomatoes, spinach and 1 litre (4 cups) water and bring to the boil. Cover and simmer for 1. hours, then add the spaghetti and season with salt and pepper. Cook for a further 15 minutes or until the spaghetti is tender but still firm. Serve hot, with grated cheese on the side.
Recipe excerpted with permission from Hazana: Jewish Vegetarian Cooking by Paola Gavin, published by Quadrille October 2017, RRP $35.00 hardcover.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion The dangerous Nazi legend behind Trump’s ruthless grab for power
- 2
Opinion A Holocaust perpetrator was just celebrated on US soil. I think I know why no one objected.
- 3
Culture Did this Jewish literary titan have the right idea about Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling after all?
- 4
Opinion I first met Netanyahu in 1988. Here’s how he became the most destructive leader in Israel’s history.
In Case You Missed It
-
Opinion Gaza and Trump have left the Jewish community at war with itself — and me with a bad case of alienation
-
Fast Forward Trump administration restores student visas, but impact on pro-Palestinian protesters is unclear
-
Fast Forward Deborah Lipstadt says Trump’s campus antisemitism crackdown has ‘gone way too far’
-
Fast Forward 5 Jewish senators accuse Trump of using antisemitism as ‘guise’ to attack universities
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.