The autumn garden brings to mind ribollita, a wondrous concoction of beans, vegetables and bread I first tasted during a trip to Tuscany. I’ve been obsessed with this soup ever since.
The love affair began during a multi-course dinner at the Admiral Palace Hotel in Chianciano Terme. Here the soup’s base was a rich, dark brown. My intent was to taste sparingly, because of the long menu, but I proceeded to finish every drop of this incredible dish. I never managed to procure this particular recipe, but I believe it had meat in it – probably pancetta. We were traveling with Franca Franzaroli of Boston’s Donna Franca Tours, who is noted for her cooking, and she offered us her version.
A few nights later, we had a distinctly different ribollita, also delicious, as part of another multi-course meal at Agricultura Palazzo Bandini. This robollita was entirely vegetarian, but also completely satisfying. I began to see that this dish, which is ladled over stale bread, samples the entire garden. Marta Valeriani, our agricultura host, is a sixth-generation resident of the farm and with her father works the land, restaurant, cooking school and inn that make up Agricultura Palazzo Bandini. She offered the ribollita recipe, which I tried at home. Me rendition was good, but not great, and I realized the problem was that I had been too lazy to properly cook the beans. Instead, I used a can of beans, but got the proportions wrong. The recipe made a huge vat of ribollita, but Bob and Nora weren’t brave enough to try it, and Aidan didn’t go for seconds. I couldn’t finish it all, so some went to waste.
I did decide to grow red chard in the garden so I could make another, smaller batch. I never got around to it last summer, but I did use the chard for a delicious bean soup from the New York Times.
