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 Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
