A former co-worker has a recipe for a black bean soup that is fantastic. The soup is rich, flavorful, slightly spicy and great for fall. I would make it all the time and in big batches to freeze for later.
However last fall, my grocery store would run out of black beans often. I wanted that rich, bean based soup for the cooler, crisper weather. Without black beans, I could not have black bean soup. I decided to make a different soup with other beans to get my soup fix.
I am usually well stocked with beans – mostly black, red kidney and cannellini beans. I wasn’t too sure about a red bean soup, but cannellini beans seemed like a great base for the soup. I always think of cannellini as a staple of Central Italy cuisine. I’ve had many Tuscan dishes featuring the bean including many a Tuscan bean dip, an appetizing Italian answer to hummus. I took out my cans of cannellini and went straight to the internet, searching “herbs and spices of Tuscan cuisine.”
Learning about the taste of Tuscany, I looked at the soup recipe and removed the Latin inspired essence of the dish like cumin and chili and added Italian flavors plus some of my own personal elements to make this soup mine. I can’t speak to the accuracy; I don’t know if there
are any Tuscan soups that use these ingredients or taste this way. However, I love this soup. The silky texture and slightly nutty flavor of the beans marries with the sweetness of the fennel seeds and the mild heat of the red pepper flakes. The tender onions and bell pepper give way with each bite while the parsley give the soup a verdant note rounding out the earthy dried herbs and the acid of lemon finishes the soup and keeps me wanting more.
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Tuscan Bean Soup
• 3 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 medium white or yellow onion, diced
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp ground black pepper
• 4 cloves of garlic, minced
• 4 green onions, thinly sliced
• 1 tsp fennel seed
• 1 tsp red pepper flakes
• 2 tsp dried basil, or to taste
• 1 tsp dried thyme, or to taste
• 1 tsp dried marjoram, or to taste
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 4 bay leaves
• 1 medium yellow bell pepper, chopped
• 4 15oz cans cannellini beans
• 2 Tbsp lemon juice (about ½ a lemon)
• 3 Tbsp fresh parsley, chopped, plus more for garnish
Heat a soup pot over medium heat; add 2 tablespoons of oil to the pot and heat through. Add most of the onion, salt and black pepper to the soup pot, saving the remainder (about a quarter of them) for later in the process. Sauté until tender, about 5 to 8 minutes.
Add the garlic, green onions, fennel seeds, red pepper flakes, basil, thyme and marjoram to the soup pot and cook until the aroma is released, about 1 minute more. The garlic will start to smell floral and the fennel seeds will smell sweet.
Add the stock to the soup pot and bring to a boil. While the stock comes to a boil, sauté the reserved onion, salt and black pepper with the yellow bell pepper in the remaining 1 tablespoon of oil.
When the stock boils and the bell pepper is tender, add about ½ to 1 cup of boiling stock to the bell peppers mixture and simmer. Meanwhile, add the beans to the soup pot and simmer on low heat, uncovered, for 20 minutes.
After simmering, remove the soup from heat and remove the bay leaves.
Purée half of the soup from the soup pot until smooth, and add the bean purée back to the soup and add the pepper mixture to the pot; stir to combine. Simmer the soup 5 minutes more, then stir in lemon juice and parsley. Taste, and adjust the seasoning as needed.
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The biggest personal touch to this soup is not puréeing the pepper in the mix; it turns the soup a little too yellow for my aesthetics. The beauty lies in the soup’s rich ivory color. It makes the pepper and parsley stand out in the dish. Its simplicity in hue parallels its straightforwardness as a wonderful meal.
Enjoy.
