Minestrone
Encyclopedia
Minestrone is the name for a variety of thick Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 soup
Soup
Soup is a generally warm food that is made by combining ingredients such as meat and vegetables with stock, juice, water, or another liquid. Hot soups are additionally characterized by boiling solid ingredients in liquids in a pot until the flavors are extracted, forming a broth.Traditionally,...

s made with vegetable
Vegetable
The noun vegetable usually means an edible plant or part of a plant other than a sweet fruit or seed. This typically means the leaf, stem, or root of a plant....

s, often with the addition of pasta
Pasta
Pasta is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine, now of worldwide renown. It takes the form of unleavened dough, made in Italy, mostly of durum wheat , water and sometimes eggs. Pasta comes in a variety of different shapes that serve for both decoration and to act as a carrier for the...

 or rice
Rice
Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima . As a cereal grain, it is the most important staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and the West Indies...

. Common ingredients include bean
Bean
Bean is a common name for large plant seeds of several genera of the family Fabaceae used for human food or animal feed....

s, onion
Onion
The onion , also known as the bulb onion, common onion and garden onion, is the most widely cultivated species of the genus Allium. The genus Allium also contains a number of other species variously referred to as onions and cultivated for food, such as the Japanese bunching onion The onion...

s, celery
Celery
Apium graveolens is a plant species in the family Apiaceae commonly known as celery or celeriac , depending on whether the petioles or roots are eaten: celery refers to the former and celeriac to the latter. Apium graveolens grows to 1 m tall...

, carrot
Carrot
The carrot is a root vegetable, usually orange in colour, though purple, red, white, and yellow varieties exist. It has a crisp texture when fresh...

s, stock, and tomato
Tomato
The word "tomato" may refer to the plant or the edible, typically red, fruit which it bears. Originating in South America, the tomato was spread around the world following the Spanish colonization of the Americas, and its many varieties are now widely grown, often in greenhouses in cooler...

es.

There is no set recipe
Recipe
A recipe is a set of instructions that describe how to prepare or make something, especially a culinary dish.-Components:Modern culinary recipes normally consist of several components*The name of the dish...

 for minestrone, since it is usually made out of whatever vegetables are in season. It can be vegetarian, contain meat
Meat
Meat is animal flesh that is used as food. Most often, this means the skeletal muscle and associated fat and other tissues, but it may also describe other edible tissues such as organs and offal...

, or contain a meat-based broth (such as chicken stock). Angelo Pellegrini
Angelo Pellegrini
Angelo Pellegrini was an author of books about the pleasures of growing and making your own food and wine, and about the Italian immigrant experience. He was also a professor of English Literature at the University of Washington. Pellegrini's family immigrated from Tuscany to McCleary,...

, however, argued that the base of minestrone is bean broth, and that Roman beans "are the beans to use for genuine minestrone".

Minestrone is one of the cornerstones of Italian cuisine
Italian cuisine
Italian cuisine has developed through centuries of social and political changes, with roots as far back as the 4th century BCE. Italian cuisine in itself takes heavy influences, including Etruscan, ancient Greek, ancient Roman, Byzantine, Jewish and Arab cuisines...

, and is almost as common as pasta
Pasta
Pasta is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine, now of worldwide renown. It takes the form of unleavened dough, made in Italy, mostly of durum wheat , water and sometimes eggs. Pasta comes in a variety of different shapes that serve for both decoration and to act as a carrier for the...

 on Italian tables.

History

Some of the earliest origins of minestrone soup pre-date the expansion of the Latin tribes of Rome into what became the Roman Republic and later Roman Empire, when the local diet was "vegetarian by necessity" and consisted mostly of vegetables, such as onions, lentils, cabbage, garlic, fava beans, mushrooms, carrots, asparagus and turnips.

During this time, the main dish of a meal would have been "pulte" or puls in English, a simple but filling porridge of spelt
Spelt
Spelt is a hexaploid species of wheat. Spelt was an important staple in parts of Europe from the Bronze Age to medieval times; it now survives as a relict crop in Central Europe and northern Spain and has found a new market as a health food. Spelt is sometimes considered a subspecies of the...

 flour cooked in salt water, to which whatever vegetables were available would have been added.

It wasn't until the 2nd century B.C., when Rome had conquered Italy and monopolized the commercial and road networks, that a huge diversity of products flooded the capital and began to change their diet, and by association, the diet of Italy most notably with the more frequent inclusion of meats, including as a stock for soups.

Spelt flour was also removed from soups, as bread had been introduced into the Roman diet by the Greeks, and Rome had opened their first commercial "fornaio", or bakery, in 171 B.C and puls became a meal largely for the poor.

However, the ancient Romans recognized the health benefits of simple or "frugal" diet (from the Latin fruges, the common name given to cereals, vegetables and legumes) and thick vegetable soups and vegetables remained a staple.

Marcus Apicius's ancient cookbook De Re Coquinaria described polus, a Roman soup dating back to 30 AD made up of farro, chickpeas, and fava beans, with onions, garlic, lard, and greens thrown in.

The Roman army
Roman army
The Roman army is the generic term for the terrestrial armed forces deployed by the kingdom of Rome , the Roman Republic , the Roman Empire and its successor, the Byzantine empire...

 is said to have marched on minestrone and pasta
Pasta
Pasta is a staple food of traditional Italian cuisine, now of worldwide renown. It takes the form of unleavened dough, made in Italy, mostly of durum wheat , water and sometimes eggs. Pasta comes in a variety of different shapes that serve for both decoration and to act as a carrier for the...

 e ceci
Chickpea
The chickpea is a legume of the family Fabaceae, subfamily Faboideae...

(or a European kind of beans and pasta), the former making use of local and seasonal ingredients, the latter due to the longevity of dried goods.

However, as eating habits and ingredients changed in Italy, so did their minestrone. Apicius updates the pultes and pulticulae with fancy trimmings such as cooked brains and wine, "illustrating the ever-present desire to improve — to glorify, as it were, a thing which once was or still is of vital importance in the daily life of humans. The nouveaux-riches of the ancient and the modern world cannot find it easy to separate themselves from their traditions nor are they wont to put up with their plainness, hence the fancy trimmings", according to researchers on the subject.

The introduction of tomato
Tomato
The word "tomato" may refer to the plant or the edible, typically red, fruit which it bears. Originating in South America, the tomato was spread around the world following the Spanish colonization of the Americas, and its many varieties are now widely grown, often in greenhouses in cooler...

es and potato
Potato
The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial Solanum tuberosum of the Solanaceae family . The word potato may refer to the plant itself as well as the edible tuber. In the region of the Andes, there are some other closely related cultivated potato species...

es from the Americas in the Mid 16th Century changed the soup by making available two ingredients which have since become staples.

However, the tradition of not losing rural roots continues today, and minestrone is now known in Italy as belonging to the style of cooking called "cucina povera" (literally "poor kitchen") meaning dishes that have rustic, rural roots, as opposed to "cucina nobile" or the cooking style of the artistocracy and nobles.

Like many Italian dishes, minestrone was probably originally not a dish made for its own sake, like for example the ancient Roman green onion soup "Patella Lucretiana", or Lucrezio's dish, though this point is argued. In other words, whereas one might set about gathering green onions, anchovies, herring sauce and honey, as called for by the recipe for Lucrezio's green onion soup, one did not gather the ingredients of minestrone with the intention of making minestrone, as evidenced by the fact the name "minestrone" did not appear until the 14th century (see Etymology). The ingredients were pooled from ingredients for other dishes, often side dish
Side dish
A side dish, sometimes referred to as a side order or simply a side, is a food item that accompanies the entrée or main course at a meal.-Common types:...

es or "contorni" plus whatever was left over, rather like the "pulte".

There are two schools of thought on when the recipe for minestrone became more formalized. One argues that in the 17th and 18th centuries minestrone emerged as a soup using exclusively fresh vegetables and was made for its own sake (meaning it no longer relied on left-overs), while the other school of thought argues that the dish had always been prepared exclusively with fresh vegetables for its own sake since the pre-Roman "pulte", but the name minestrone lost its meaning of being made with left-overs.

Etymology

The word minestrone has its root in the Latin word "minus" or minor or less, which was applied to servants, as they were considered subordinates. Hence, the word "minestrone" originates from the Latin word "minestrare" or literally "that which is served,". The verb is from circa 1300, originally "to serve (food or drink)" and shares the same root as the verb and noun "minister".

Modern usage

Due to its unique origins and the absence of a fixed recipe
Recipe
A recipe is a set of instructions that describe how to prepare or make something, especially a culinary dish.-Components:Modern culinary recipes normally consist of several components*The name of the dish...

, minestrone is not particularly similar across Italy: it varies depending on traditional cooking times, ingredients, and season
Season
A season is a division of the year, marked by changes in weather, ecology, and hours of daylight.Seasons result from the yearly revolution of the Earth around the Sun and the tilt of the Earth's axis relative to the plane of revolution...

. Minestrone ranges from a thick and dense texture with very boiled-down vegetables, to a more brothy soup with large quantities of diced and lightly cooked vegetable
Vegetable
The noun vegetable usually means an edible plant or part of a plant other than a sweet fruit or seed. This typically means the leaf, stem, or root of a plant....

s that may include meat
Meat
Meat is animal flesh that is used as food. Most often, this means the skeletal muscle and associated fat and other tissues, but it may also describe other edible tissues such as organs and offal...

s.

In modern Italian there are three words corresponding to the English word 'soup': zuppa, which is used in the sense of tomato soup
Tomato soup
Tomato soup is a soup made from tomatoes. It may be served hot or cold, and can be made in many styles. It may be smooth in texture, but there are recipes which include chunks of tomato, cream and/or chicken stock. Popular toppings for tomato soup include sour cream, and croutons. Tomato soup is...

, or fish soup
Fish soup
Fisherman's Soup or halászlé ; , ribena chorba; , ribina čorba) is a hot, spicy paprika-based river fish soup, originating as a dish of Hungarian cuisine, a bright red hot soup prepared with generous amounts of hot paprika and carp or mixed river fish, characteristic for the cuisines of the...

; minestra, which is used in the sense of a more substantial soup such as a vegetable soup, and also for 'dry' soups, namely pasta dishes; and minestrone, which means a very substantial or large soup or stew
Stew
A stew is a combination of solid food ingredients that have been cooked in liquid and served in the resultant gravy. Ingredients in a stew can include any combination of vegetables , meat, especially tougher meats suitable for slow-cooking, such as beef. Poultry, sausages, and seafood are also used...

, though the meaning has now come to be associated with this particular dish.

Regional variations

Minestrone alla Genovese is a variant typical of Liguria
Liguria
Liguria is a coastal region of north-western Italy, the third smallest of the Italian regions. Its capital is Genoa. It is a popular region with tourists for its beautiful beaches, picturesque little towns, and good food.-Geography:...

, which contains greater use of herbs, including pesto
Pesto
Pesto is a sauce originating in Genoa in the Liguria region of northern Italy , and traditionally consists of crushed garlic, basil and pine nuts blended with olive oil and Parmigiano Reggiano and Fiore Sardo...

.
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