Tuscan Cannellini and Kale Soup

Okay, I give up. WordPress … you win! I will post this with ONE picture. I’ve been trying since last Wednesday to upload a batch of pictures for this recipe, but until this morning, I couldn’t load a single one. And now I have … a single one. Sorry about that. You’ll just have to imagine the spoon close-up, and the bowl close-up, and the picture I managed to snap of Big Foot right outside my kitchen window while I was making this soup. It’s a shame. Mine wasn’t all blurry and questionable like the others that have been published. And now no one will ever see the way he was smiling and waving at me.

This soup was so good, my first thought upon taking my first bite was, “I’d better make a second pot right now.” But then my second thought was, “I’d better write down what I threw in this pot first.”

Delicious AND good-for-you. That’s a nice duo.

Tuscan Cannellini and Kale Soup

• about 2 TBSP olive oil (a couple of good glugs around the pot)
• one large onion, diced
• 2 carrots, sliced into rounds
• 2 stalks celery, diced
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 1 15 oz can diced tomatoes
• 3 cups (about 2 15 oz cans) white beans, cooked
• 1 tsp salt (you may want more, but start with this)
• 1 TBSP fresh rosemary, minced, or 1 tsp dried
• 1 TBSP fresh thyme or 1 tsp dried
• 1/2 TBSP fresh sage, minced, or 1/2 tsp dried
• 1/4 to 1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
• 1 1/2 cups kale (I used dinosaur kale), cut chiffonade-style (see note below)
• the juice of 1/2 lemon

In a big-enough pot, heat olive oil till sizzling. Saute onion, carrots and celery for about 7 minutes, or until starting to caramelize.

Add minced garlic and cook another three minutes, stirring frequently so the garlic doesn’t burn or get crispy.

Add enough of the vegetable broth that you can deglaze all the browned bits from the bottom of the pot. Add the rest of the broth, the tomatoes, the beans, and all the seasonings. Cover and simmer until the vegetables are tender … about 20 minutes.

While the soup is cooking, cut the kale. Just remove the thicker part of the stem on the bottom, then roll up the remaining parts of the leaves together and slice in thin, elegant strips. Easy, huh? And aren’t you glad you can now throw the word “chiffonade” in a conversation?

When the vegetables are tender, throw the kale in the pot and stir. Let cook another five minutes. Squeeze the juice of half a lemon over the pot. You can add the juice from that second half to the individual bowls if you’d like.

Makes 4 hefty or six polite portions. 😀