Minestrone Soup
(Knife Skills)
..where teens can learn to cook restaurant quality meals for the family
Minestrone soup (knife skills)
A simple but tasty recipe to practice your knife skills on. You can eliminate or swap any ingredients for anything similar. But aim to keep it colourful. It's meant to look as striking as it tastes.Tip: your goal for this recipe is to finish up feeling pretty proud of yourself at how well you're cutting up the vegetables. If you don't come out the other side feeling pretty pleased with yourself, then you haven't gone in slowly and mindfully enough to focus on improving your knife skills! (We've got videos etc below to help you).
ADJUST SERVINGS
Most of our recipes are for 4 people. You can check and adjust the serving size by clicking on the red number above.
GET SHOPPING!
This is a reminder to check what ingredients you need to buy and add them to your shopping list. It’s good to do your own food shopping, but at the very least, you’re head chef, so send a family member out to the shops for you!
GET ORGANISED
Remember ‘Skill 2’ of the Big 5: Become super-organised.:
Add your own private notes:
Equipment
- chefs knife (that's the large, sharp, kitchen knife that you'll use more than anything else)
- Cutting board
- Large saucepan
- wooden spoon
- Measuring cups and spoons
- 3 bowls
- 1 sieve
Ingredients
- 2 carrots
- 2 stalks of celery
- 1 large onion
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1 zucchini/courgette
- 1 cup green beans
- 1 litre vegetable broth or stock
- 1 can tomatoes with their juice
- 1 can drained kidney beans
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tsp dried basil
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 1 cup small pasta e.g., macaroni
- Parmesan cheese or Parmigiano Reggiano grated (for serving)
Instructions
Prep in advance
- OK, before you start, ensure your knife is sharp! Follow our how-to here. You cannot expect to use a knife well if it's blunt. We recommend you do this well in advance of starting to make this recipe. Like…now?
- Wash the green beans, celery and courgette/zuchini under cold water and set them out to dry (it doesn't matter if they don't dry fully, they're about to go for a swim!)
- Have you noticed the “Cook mode” switches on your screen? If you slide one on, it stops your device screen from falling asleep. So you won’t have to keep waking it up again.
- Peel 2 carrots
- Dice the carrots and set aside in a large bowl (see video). Keep the knife tip end on the board as if it's magnetised to it. But slide it freely back and forth, pushing forward and down as you cut through the carrot, then sliding it back towards your body as you slide along ready for the next cut. Tip: imagine you're on camera in front of a panel of judges who'll judge how well you'll do this. It'll keep you perfoming where you need to be!
- Dice the celery (you can chop each stalk into slices or go down the middle of the long length of the stalk and then chop that into slices (making them half the size). Up to you and how much chopping you want to do! Just do it better than you did the carrots. Just one tiny bit better. Set it aside in the same bowl as the carrot once done.
- Peel and dice your 1 large onion then set aside in a separate bowl to the vegetables. Definitely watch the video for guidance – it shows the fastest possible way to cut an onion with a knife. Do this for a lifetime, and you'll save enough time to go on an extra holiday!
- Mince the 2 cloves garlic by finely chopping (see video), and set aside in a third separate bowl (we want these separate from the onions and other vegetables)
- Dice the 1 zucchini/courgette and set aside in a bowl. You are striving to make this your best session with the knife yet, aren't you?
- Add enough water in your kettle to make 1 litre vegetable broth or stock (and put it on to boil)
- Trim and chop the 1 cup green beans and set aside in the same bowl as the zucchini/courgette. You can trim the ends off, and chop it how you want. Either in half, thirds, or smaller if you're loving all this chopping!
- Once your kettle has boiled, make your 1 litre vegetable broth or stock (according to the packet instructions). And make sure the stock cubes have fully dissolved then set aside
- Grate your Parmesan cheese or Parmigiano Reggiano and set aside. All this has been done under no real pressure! But soon you'll be turning the heat on..
- Get someone from your family to set the table for dinner. It's soup tell them. (Hopefully they work out this means bowls and spoons.)
Let's Cook!
- Add about 1 tbsp olive oil to your pot. About means about. Don't sweat it out trying to get it right. It really does not matter if you're a little under or over. It's very useful to pay attention to what a tablespoon of liquid looks like. It'll speed your cooking up for future. Which means that holiday you take because you're being efficient, can be even longer…
- Heat the pot over medium heat.
- Add your onions to to pan and stir until softened. Keep them moving. Might take a few minutes to soften them slightly.
- Add minced garlic to the pan and stir for about 1 minute.Let's introduce you to our built in timers. When you see a time like this that's a link, click it and a timer will start on your screen! –> 1 minute
- Pour in your bowl of carrots and celery and cook for 5 minutes. (You clicked the timer, right?)
- Add in your 1 can tomatoes with their juice
- Add in your 1 litre vegetable broth or stock
- Bring to a boil – that means lots of bubbles – and stir for a minute
- Reduce heat to simmer – that means the big bubbles turn into tiny bubbles. Bubbles are still actively appearing, they're just small. And add 1 tsp dried oregano
- Then add 1 tsp dried basil and stir well
- Season with a bit of salt and pepper to taste (remember don't put in too much! Go for a pinch or so, stir it in, taste it with a clean spoon, then add more if required and repeat the taste test until you're happy).
- Add your bowl of zucchini/courgettes and green beans
- Put a lid on the pan and simmer for 15 minutes. (You're getting good at these timers aren't you?)
- After the 15 minutes, open your kidney beans and drain them in a sieve and run cold water over them until it all runs clear and any gunk is washed off the beans. Then pour them into the soup
- Now, this next bit will take some judgement. You might want to ask a parent for their opinion. There's no rule on how much liquid to have in your minestrone soup. You could have minimal, and it's more of a solid meal. Or lots. It's down to your preference. But THINK about it. At this stage, you may need to add a bit more water if much of your liquid has boiled away. Add some more to suit, and bring it to the boil ready for the next step.
- Add 1 cup small pasta and cook until al dente. (See video).
- Shout to your family to come to the table
- Serve hot and garnish with salt, pepper and your Parmesan cheese or Parmigiano Reggiano
Please share with us how you went!We need your feedback so we can improve the recipes and help others succeed! Please let us know by leaving a comment 🙂