26 June 2007

Minestrone (with how-to)

I came across this recipe in Simply Recipes. This is another case of my mom really wanting something and asking me to make it. However, to have the skill to make Minestrone is not bad (vegetables are good for you), it's just... The long hour or so of boiling. I think of the fossil fuels. Anyway, it can't be that bad, and after all that time, you can feed a LOT of people. As you can see, those are halves of pan de sal, toasted, just for humor.
Minestrone
The process isn't hard, but if you don't have a system for chopping/ slicing/ dicing vegetables, you have no business trying to make soup. Practice, practice, practice.
Mise en place 2
So, as usual, get all your ingredients at hand for preparation. You can see I have a bag of powdered chicken broth. Nowhere near as good as the real thing, but you already know I don't like cooking for long hours. Think of the environment! I've washed the beans (minimize the toot-toot), opened cans, washed vegetables.
chopped
I thought of making a demo on how to chop vegetables but I guess it'll have to be another day. This is the chopped zucchini, carrot, potato, and minced garlic (onion not yet done), ready to go.
beans
Oh, yeah, while I'm chopping, the beans are already on the heat. Multitasking. There's chicken broth and bacon also in there.
before boiling
So, after cooking the garlic, onion, carrots, potatoes, and zucchini for 5 minutes, I dump the rest of the chicken stock and diced tomatoes in. And then I begin to study...
puree
But I'm interrupted as the beans are done. I puree half of them in a blender, then put it back in the bean pot. I also fish out the boiled bacon and dice it.
cooked
Once the vegetables are tender (oh, about 40 minutes), I add the contents of the bean pot and the bacon, then cook for a few more minutes. Done! Finally.

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