fire-roasted ribollita (tuscan bread stew)
Ribollita is I guess somewhat of a famous dish of the Tuscan countryside, but until tonight I’ve never encountered it in the wild. It’s well-known to be from Italy and translates to “reboiled” in English, but its history is medieval to the core: plates in those days used to be made out of stale bread (called “trenchers”), and after banquets servants would gather up the breadplates and boil them. That was dinner. Reboiled. Ribollita has a bit more magic to it.
While I’m most definitely the lord of my fiefdom, I love a peasant dish for a few reasons. They’re typically flexible on ingredients, rustically imperfect in preparation, and often vegetarian by nature—meat throughout history always was a luxury, and I try to treat it that way today. While the idea of a sogged-out bread-porridge rendition of a minestrone never sounded all that compelling, this version by Bon Appetit introduced me to the genius idea of a dual bread technique that solves what I expected to suck about it: a portion of the bread goes in the soup for thickness and body (as is tradition), and the other portion is spread on top, oiled up, and then blasted in the oven to create a textural built-in crouton top.
look who’s trenching now!!!
I was in a fiery mood tonight, and therefore so is my ribollita: it uses fire-roasted diced tomatoes instead of mellow regular ones, a hefty scooplet of chopped calabrian chilis, and some zesty pizza-parlor-esque Italian seasoning blend with a lot of oregano. This one has double the beans of most recipes for a little extra substance; it’s 100% meatless and fully vegan if you leave out the parm. But unlike the nondescript vegetable soups of hot bars past, this one’s got BIG flavor, and is enormously satisfying all by itself. Impossible to screw up and easy to love, but don’t count on having as much leftover as you expect.
A note on reheating: if you save some, try to keep the crunchy croutons on top of your storage vessel. I let my Dutch oven cool for a bit, covered it, and put it directly into the fridge. The next day, let it warm up a bit on the counter, then simmer gently on the stove until heated through. The croutons won’t stay crunchy, but they will stay intact, and it’ll be a bit more traditional of a ribolitta at the end—not a bad thing!
RECIPE
Effortful time: 20 minutes
Total time: 40 minutes
Serves: 4-6
YOU NEED
1 medium shallot or small onion, diced
6 cloves of garlic, smashed and sliced
3 carrots, peeled and roughly chopped into coins
3 ribs of celery, roughly chopped (fun fact—spice wholesalers often sell dried celery that can serve this purpose in a pinch if you find you’re often wasting the celery you buy to cook with, which is also what I used 1 1/2 tbsp. of tonight because I forgot to buy fresh)
1 tbsp. chopped Calabrian chiles in oil (please buy them to keep around, you won’t regret it!) or substitute 1 tsp. chili flakes
1 tbsp. Italian herb blend, this is my absolute favorite
28 oz. can diced fire-roasted tomatoes
2 cans cannellini or other small white beans, drained and rinsed
4 cups vegetable broth, I used Better Than Bouillon
1 bunch Lacinato kale, de-stemmed and leaves roughly chopped; you can sub chopped green curly kale, any kind of chard, savoy cabbage, or rapini if you’d prefer
1”x2” rind or chunk of parmigiano reggiano
8 oz. crusty bread, preferably a day old, torn into bite sized pieces—if yours isn’t stale, throw the cubes on a sheet at 350ºF for 15 minutes and then turn the oven to 425º to finish the recipe
4 tbsp. olive oil + 1 tbsp. more for the bread topping
MAKE IT
Get prepped. Preheat the oven to 425°F. Dice your shallot, smash and slice your garlic, peel and chop your carrots, chop your celery, and prepare your kale. None of it needs to be too perfect or neatly done, just keep it moving. By the time you’re finished, the oven will be hot!
Cook your soffrito. In a large dutch oven or soup pot (5qt or so), heat the 4 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat. Add the shallot, garlic, carrot, and celery to the pot and sauté until the garlic and shallot are fragrant but not yet browning, a little less than 2 minutes. Sprinkle with 1 tsp. of salt. Turn the heat down to low to sweat the vegetables, 7-8 minutes more. Splash in a little water if anything is starting to brown.
Build your soup. Pour in your can of tomatoes, vegetable broth, and rinsed beans, then add your Italian seasoning, chiles, and pepper. Give it all a good stir. Tuck in the parm rind and simmer for 5 minutes.
Add your kale and bread. Fold in the kale, stirring it up to ladle hot soup on top of it so that it wilts. Then add 1/2 the bread cubes and stir again. Let this simmer again for 5 minutes more. Taste and see if you need more salt for your preference. Mine was fine, but if your broth is less salty than mine was, you may want to adjust.
Prep your soup for baking. Turn off the stove. It’s oven time. Give the soup one final stir, then scoop your remaining bread cubes on top of the stew and do not stir it again. Drizzle with the remaining 1 tbsp. of olive oil—or, do what I did, and just spray it with 100% olive oil to evenly coat all the bread.
Bake your soup. Pop it in the oven uncovered for 15-20 minutes or until the bread is browned and toasted.
Serve it up. Let cool for 1 min before ladling into bowls, making sure you’ve got a balance of crunchy top bread. Top with shaved or grated parm and a tiny, delicate lil drizzle of evoo.