|
Home | Italy Revisited | Bookshelf | Plays | About Mary Melfi | Contact Us |
|
Ingredients For the base:
Directions 1. Heat the olive oil in a large pot.
Notes Minestrone is generally viewed as a soup, though it comes closer to a vegetable stew. Some food historians believe the recipe for minestrone pre-dates the ancient Romans, while others believe the recipe only became known (or "formalized") in Italy around the 17th century. All food historians agree that there is no set recipe for the dish -- it is usually made out of whatever vegetables are in season. My aunt, Zia Rosina, also noted that when she was growing up in the 1930s in Casacalenda, Molise, minestrone was generally made with anything that one had at hand -- if one had beans which had been left over from some other dish, one used them. If one had fresh peas, one used them, and if one didn't, well, then one made do without them. Apparently, in the 1930s carrots were not grown in and around Casacalenda, so carrots were obviously not used, but beets, the white-colored variety which were locally grown, were often added to the soup. For obvious reasons minestrone was more popular around harvest time than in the middle of winter, though my aunt did say that many of the vegetables that were grown did keep for a long time. Potatoes for instance, which don't last longer than two weeks in our North American homes, kept fresh for months. Farmers figured out where best to store them (My aunt's father kept his on the roof) and regularly removed the eyes of the potatoes so as to prolong their shelf life. Farmers, out of necessity, were very resourceful. Of course, the more land a farmer owned, the easier it was to maintain a well-stocked kitchen. Nonetheless, most farmers had enough to eat in the winter. At least, this seems to have been the case in Molise. Few first-generation immigrants from Molise that I have come across complain of not having had enough to eat (prior to World War II), they do complain of having little variety in their diet -- but that's not the same thing. So in better-to-do households cooks added whatever was available at the market when they made their minestrone (Might have even added fresh pork belly -- "vendresca"!) and in poorer ones, they added as little as possible. Most cooks used herbs to flavor the dish, but no one added chicken stock. Prior to World War II chicken cubes were not available in the countryside, and certainly no one in their right mind (Not even the very rich!) would slaughter a chicken to make chicken broth for a simple everyday meal. And yes, in the 1930s, minestrone, was a meal in itself (and not just a first or second course). One more thing -- when a cook added tomatoes to the base, the dish was known as "red" minestrone and when no tomatoes were used it was known as "white" minestrone. Photo: by the contributor. |