This classic Italian soup is brimming with beans, vegetables, and parmesan.
Kat Vel's Hearty Minestrone Soup With Whipped Butter and Sourdough
This classic Italian soup is brimming with beans, vegetables, and parmesan.
Welcome to Put on a Spread, a recipe series that takes you inside the kitchens – and dining rooms – of some of our favourite home cooks. For this instalment, Melbourne-based cook and Golden Groves olive oil creator, Kat Vel, shares her recipe for a hearty minestrone soup.
Minestrone is a fantastic soup to turn to when the weather turns cool, you need to use vegetables that are soon to expire, or you're looking for a nutritious meal to make. Filled with a medley of veggies and beans and topped with parmesan to add a rich, cheesy flavor to the broth, Kat Vel's take on this Italian classic delivers the heartwarming flavours you'd hope for.
In this recipe, she also shares how to make delicious whipped butter that's to be spread on crusty bread and served alongside the soup.
Whether you're in need of a comforting meal on a rainy day, a satisfying midweek lunch, or you're in serious need of more vegetables in your diet, this nutritious minestrone delivers on all fronts.
Ingredients
- 1L vegetable stock
- 700ml passata
- ½ cup olive oil
- 1 zucchini, chopped
- 2 small carrots, chopped
- 2 stick celery, chopped
- 1 onion, finely chopped
- 1 leek, finely chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
- 1 potato, chopped
- 1 x 400g can cannellini beans, washed, liquid removed
- 1 handful kale, chopped (stalks removed)
- 4 dried bay leaves
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- Salt and pepper
- Basil leaves
- Parmesan (optional)
- 250g unsalted butter
Method
Add your olive oil to a deep soup pot. Sautee your garlic, leek, onion, celery, and carrot with 1 tsp of salt, the bay leaves, and oregano over medium heat for 5 minutes until translucent.
Add your zucchini, potato, and cannellini beans to the pot and pour in your stock. Once your stock comes to a boil, turn the heat to medium-low and add in your passata.
Let your soup simmer for 45 minutes uncovered or until it has thickened and the potato is cooked through. Stir occasionally. Add salt and pepper to taste if needed.
Turn your soup of the heat, add the chopped kale on top and stir through until it has slightly wilted.
Plate up your soup while steaming hot, sprinkle some parmesan and fresh on top, and drizzle a small lick of extra virgin olive oil on top for added flavour.
For the whipped butter
Melt butter in a saucepan. Once the butter has melted, turn the heat up and keep cooking it over medium heat for another 5 minutes approximately until the butter begins to brown and separate – you’ll see milk solids in the melted butter.
Once the milk solids appear, pour the butter in a bowl. Place the bowl on top of another bowl with a generous amount of ice in it.
With a whisk, star whipping the butter. As the butter cools due to the temperature of the ice, the butter will begin to set in pillowy waves, resembling whipped butter (approx. 5 minutes).
Top the butter with flaky sea salt and serve alongside your soup and with crusty bread.
For more from Kat, follow her at @katvel__
Photography by Maddie Roux. Styling by Beck Simon.
