Tuscan Bisque
When my daughter was a year and a half old, we organized a big family and friends trip to Florence, Italy. One of our highlights was a cooking class in Chianti, an amazing hands on experience lead by two warm and super-knowledgeable mustachioed ladies. We rolled pasta, cooked Tuscan beans, and created some of the most amazing dishes I’d ever eaten. The flavors of this soup remind me of the trip, though it’s a very different approach than the class took. I’m a big fan of slow cookers and freezer meals, and for busy folks it can be time (and life!) saving.
Tuscan Bisque
2015-01-12 18:56:53
Serves 6
Prep Time
15 min
Cook Time
4 hr
Total Time
4 hr 15 min
Ingredients
- 1 Tbsp olive oil
- 1 lb sweet Italian sausage
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 scallions, thinly sliced (or equivalent amount of onion, leek, or shallot)
- 4 cups chopped kale, washed, de-stemmed, and somewhat densely packed
- 2-3 yukon gold potatoes, quartered and sliced thinly, skin on
- 1-2 cups cannelini beans*, soaked overnight in water, and drained
- 2-3 shakes of red pepper flakes (or more if you like some kick)
- 1 Tbsp tomato paste
- 2 Tbsp liquid aminos
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 5 cups chicken stock**
- 1 cup heavy cream
- 1 cup milk
Instructions
- Warm olive oil in the slow cooker using the "brown" setting; add sausage and sauté until brown and no pink remains, breaking up meat into small, bite sized chunks. Add salt and scallions and briefly allow to brown. Turn off cooker.
- Add kale (it will almost fill most cookers!), potatoes, beans, pepper, tomato paste, aminos, and garlic powder. Slowly pour stock, cream, and milk over all and gently stir. Cook on low 3-4 hours. A good stir after an hour is helpful but not required.
Notes
- 1. *Cannelinis can be replaced by flageolets, navy, garbanzo, lima, gigantas, or kidney beans; canned works fine.
- 2. **I use frozen homemade stock and add it, still frozen, on top of all my ingredients. It thaws and becomes soup just fine without much trouble and requires no change to the cooking time. You may also use vegetable or garlic stock.
- 3. This would be lovely with a fish stock and fish balls or chunks of hearty firm white fish; reduce cooking time to 2 hours and add fish balls or chunks during last 30 minutes of cooking so they are just cooked through but not overcooked. I also think thinly sliced fresh garlic, sliced zucchini, or chopped fresh tomatoes would be lovely additions.
- 4. TO MAKE A FREEZER MEAL: Brown meat ahead of time. Bag and freeze with the scallions, kale, beans, and remainder of ingredients EXCEPT potato, stock, and milk/cream. These must be added when you start your slow cooker. However, the kale and beans do not suffer much texture-wise as the slow cook makes them very tender and causes them to lose shape in any case, so it's fine to freeze them; the potato gets discolored and weird so I don't recommend it.
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