A Pretty Ribollita

This is the "Cavolo Nero", litterally "Black Cabbage". It is a variety of Kale. With its "Pretty" and distinct color points out the other "greens" in the garden. From a distance, it looks almost blue.

The Cavolo Nero is one of the compulsory ingredients of the Ribollita, being the others onions, beans, the almost omni-present extra virgin olive oil. Of course Tuscan Olive Oil, as the Ribollita is a soup from Firenze.

What exactly is the Ribollita?

Above all, I should eliminate the word "exactly". My mistake, sorry. I know, being Italian, that my Country, although the most beautiful in the world, 

is also the farest from adjetives like regular, normal, standard and exact. 

So, what is the Ribollita?

It is a soup, which meaning is "Boiled again", or "Boiled twice".

The use to cook it twice seems to have its roots in the far past, when a certain soup was created with veggies of little economic value (cabbages....), onions ( disliked by the snobby rich people), poor parts of the animals (feet, heads) otherwises wasted in the aristocratic palaces. Once the meat with some of the vegetables had been eaten the first day, the second day the soup was "boiled again" with stale bread to increase its volume. 

For sure this soup was ( still is, by the way) the farest thing from "pretty", as well as it was (and still is) deliciuos and nutritional. 

Today, as it is the "regular" custom in Firenze, almost every single inhabitant seems to have the "exact" recipe of the Ribollita. Which, in my not evaluable opinion, doesn't exist.... as in Italy there are no two heads thinking in the same way.

Most of the typical restaurants serve a good ribollita: green(ish), earthy, thick, substantial, drizzled with the "omni-present" extra virgin olive oil, sprinkled with fresh ground black pepper, delicious especially in the cold winter days.

Each restaurant with their own twist.

Each housewife with their exclusive "exact" recipe, got in heritage by mother, grandmother, great grandmother....

All of them absolutey delicious.

All of them different.

No one "pretty"

At least I have never seen a "pretty" Ribollita.

Recently I gave a cooking lesson. The participants, although very nice and with good cooking skills, didn't know "exactly" what they wanted to cook ( the "exact" seems to be not exclusively an Italian prerogative), as they wanted something different from what they were already able to cook. 

So, as the lesson was going on, I was bombed by several questions to which I was happy to answer. The lesson also was veering toward slightly different preparations, than the ones planned at the beginning. 

At a certain point I was asked if I knew the Ribollita. 

For as much as I  know  to know it  - you never complete to know one single thing, especially in Italy: as long as you know to know something, that something may always be or become  different... - , I answered "yes".

"... and, you know.... I had a Ribollita last night in a restaurant. I knew it as I had it other times. But... it was ...not looking good. I mean: it was delicious. But, it didn't look pretty."  . This was what I was told during that lesson.

I did answer with my voice, as I didn't know what to say. Maybe my eyes talked for me.

"...see... Is there a way to cook a Ribollita that,  more than good, looks pretty?"

I have thought and thought (different kinds of thought ), but I haven't found a way to make a Pretty Ribollita yet.

But, there is something I know to know about myself: I am stubborn.

I  promise: my next frontier of Ribollita will be to create a Pretty one (never mind if not good...)

RIBOLLITA

Ingredients for 6:

1 onion chopped

1 leek, sliced

2 carrots diced

500 gr ( 17 oz ) black cabbage, shredded

2 celery stalks

¼ cup of extra virgin olive oil

15 gr (1/2 oz ) 1 tsp tomato paste

250 gr ( 8 oz ) cooked white beans,

salt and pepper

500 gr ( 17 oz ) of Tuscan stale bread

optional vegetal broth

Heat extra virgin olive oil in a large soup pot. Add onion and leek and sautè until golden in colour.  Add chopped carrot and celery and let them wilt. Add Tomato paste, then the black cabbage, pouring  hot vegetable broth as needed:

Add the remaining vegetables, sprinkle with salt and pepper and stir well. Cover and cook until reduced by half of the original volume. Add tomato paste and hot water  (or vegetal broth)( the more water you add the less dense the soup will be ), and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and cool for the least one hour. At the end of cooking time add the stale bread; mix well and bring to a boil again. Serve warm with a sprinkle of extra virgin olive oil.