Tuscan White Bean Stew
This is a quick and simple soup with fairly flexible ingredients. I managed to buy some beans other than black beans (oh how I love black beans!), so I was inspired to make an Italian-style soup with ingredients I had hanging around.
I like this soup because you do the cooking and the prepping at the same time. While your onions are softening, you’re cutting the carrots and potatoes. While those are simmering, you’re draining the beans and slicing the seitan. By the time the kale goes in, the soup is nearly done. Chopping the carrots and potatoes very small not only makes this a quick cooking meal, but it also makes your very humble soup seem fancier. I also like how you’re able to get a little bit of everything in each spoonful.
Tuscan White Bean Stew
Serves two
1/2 Onion, finely chopped
2 Medium Carrots, sliced into very thin coins
1 Medium Russet Potato, cut into a 1/4″ dice
2 Cups Water
1 Can White Beans, drained and rinsed (I used Great Northern)
1/2 tsp Oregano
1/2 tsp Thyme
1 tsp Salt
2 Tbs Tomato Paste
1/2 Cup Seitan, sliced thin (optional)
2-3 Large Kale Leaves, deveined and roughly chopped
2-3 tsp Lemon Juice
Fresh herbs for garnish, optional
Saute the onions over medium-low heat in a medium sized, heavy pot that has a lid. Slice the carrots into 1/8″ coins and add to pot. Cut potato into 1/4″ dice and add to pot, stirring occasionally. Add water and loosen any stuff that has stuck to the bottom of the pot with a wooden spoon. Add salt, oregano, tomato paste and stir. Cover and turn head down to a low boil.
Slice seitan and kale, drain and rinse the beans. Add seitan and beans to pot and stir. The stew should be quite thick. Add kale and lemon juice. Taste and season if necessary. Simmer for a few minutes until kale is tender. Carrots should be tender, and the potato should be soft but still hold its shape. Serve and garnish with fresh herbs, shown here with thyme.
Mmm, this looks yummy!
That looks really good. Mmm. I’ve never used kale before (!!), and this looks like a good introduction to it.
May I add your blog link to the side of my blog?
The beauty of the Internet is that you don’t have to ask. Google added her site to their search results, right? I have a sneaking suspicion they didn’t ask for her permission. The Internet is a public forum. You don’t have to ask permission to say, “Hey, look what I found over there!”
I love soup! This looks very good. Hopefully I’ll be cooking up some bean soup later this week, although you never know what will happen, I might just end up eating falafel again.
Wow, I’ve been reading this blog and I’ve gotta say it looks great- I just went vegan and I’ll definitely have to try some of these recipes.
If somebody could give me some advice, though… I’m planning on making vegan carrot cupcakes for my birthday, but my mom doesn’t want to try them because the recipe contains tofu and she’s, well, not very adventurous. Can anyone think of a way to get her to at least try one, or will I have to resort to baking two batches and using a little cupcake switcheroo trickery?
Thanks TB!
Anna – You should definitely try kale! I love the stuff. :)
Emmie – Isn’t soup the best? But hey, there’s nothing wrong with falafel. Now I want falafel!
Laura – I just emailed you!
it’s delicious! Im eating it right now. I didnt have any kale so I used parsley and it works. thanks for the recipe, its definetely a keeper!
this looks delicious i cant wait until trying it
i made this last night for dinner, and it was absolutely delicious! what’s really great is that the ingredients are things that i normally have on hand anyway (although i substituted fresh baby spinach for the kale.) it’s quick and easy to make, not to mention nourishing and warm on a cold winter’s evening. good comfort food. mine looked just like your picture! :-)
i also downloaded your app for my iphone, which is very handy. thanks for all the work you do!
This was fantastic! Didn’t have the exact ingredients, but here are the modifications I made:
– Used broccoli instead of kale.
– Also added some cayenne pepper
– Used chick peas for the beans
– No potato
– Added fresh chopped parsley as a garnish
Yum yum indeed! Thank you for the recipe :)
I just made this awesome dish! I love it. Thanks again.
My husband and I love this recipe. We increased the tomato paste a bit and used cannellini beans. We also used homemade spicy seitan. It’s really good over brown rice!
Just wanted to let you know that I made this tonight and it was delicious! I was at the grocery store wondering about dinner, so I pulled out my iPhone, fired up the VYY app, and found this gem. I love the app with the shopping list right there! I did leave out the seitan, and subbed spinach for kale ’cause we don’t have that at my grocery store, but otherwise I did things as directed. I can’t wait to have the leftovers for lunch tomorrow! =)
Please tell me what seitan is, I’ve never heard of it.
Thank you, Judi
this soup is fast, cheap, and easy. healthy too. i substitute a sweet potato for the russet.
What combination in this soup makes up a “complete protein”? Please reply. Thanks. Therese