by Donatella Cinelli Colombini

Some vegetables are cooked three times: boiled, fried and recooked in tomato. In the end, even cauliflower, which is normally not very tasty, becomes a king’s treat.
In Montalcino, one of the most delicious recipes is made with the same three cooking and traditionally solemn lunch of August: rooster stewed with recooked celery .
Here I describe a winter version based on thistles that brings to the table the intense taste of the Tuscan tradition and can be served as a side dish of a roast or alone.

INGREDIENTS FOR CARDI RIFATTI

A cardoon of about one kilo, 8 ripe tomatoes or 150 g of tomato sauce, two eggs, flour, garlic, extra virgin olive oil, salt and black pepper.

PREPARATION OF CARDI RIFATTI

Wash, cut into pieces of about ten centimeters the ribs of the thistle removing with the knife the hardest ribs. Boil them in salted water for over half an hour.

Peel the tomatoes, break them and toss them in the pan where the garlic is frying in the extra virgin olive oil. Add salt, sprinkle with black pepper and slowly remove the sauce.
Mix the eggs and salt, flour the thistle, pass them in the eggs and then throw them in the hot oil making them brown on each side.…

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Typically the soup of Tuscan bread is a very tasty vegetable soup poured on the bread. It is therefore vegan. Only the ciancifricola and Easter soup contain also the egg.
There is however one exception: in Trequanda. The recipe book of the small medieval village near Fattoria del Colle there are two bread soups with pork. The soup with the paw and the trequandina soup.
Below I transcribe the recipe that I received from the housewives of Trequanda and that was illustrated by Silvia Argilli with extraordinary skill. Silvia is one of the young polyglots who welcome tourists in the farm house of Fattoria del Colle but has a past as a painter and illustrator.

 TREQUANDA SOUP  INGREDIENTS

Half a kilo of white beans
One red onion
Two ounces of salted Cinta Senese ham (it is essential that it is very fat as an alternative use ham and bacon) cut into very thick slices
Parsley

Half a glass of extra virgin olive oil
A quarter of cabbage
One carrot

Two ribs of celery,
Chard,
Spinach,
Two or three zucchini,
A handful of green beans,
300 grams of Tuscan homemade bread without salt
The Tuscan cuisine is simple but to release its intense flavors needs ingredients of excellent quality. Freshly picked vegetables and real bread made with sourdough. Come to the Fattoria del Colle Restaurant to taste it and you will understand the difference

PREPARATION OF TREQUANDA SOUP

Soak the white beans the day before. …

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By Donatella Cinelli Colombini

The name of this dish changes from village to village but the recipe changes very  little. It is a delicious traditional bread soup with cabbage from southern Tuscany, typical of the winter time . In Montalcino we call it washed bread, in Trequanda, where the Fattoria del Colle is located, they call it slices or cabbage with slices.
More than with any other dish you can appreciate the freshly pressed extra virgin oil , especially what is made from olives with a full taste and fragrant scent.
Consequently like all very simple recipes the quality of the result depends on the ingredients that must be extraordinary, the cabbage obviously but mostly the  EVO oil, the vinegar and especially the bread, rigorously without salt and handmade with sourdough.
The most suitable wine to accompany this soup is a Chianti Superiore or a Doc Orcia that come from the  same territory as the oil that, in our case, is from Trequanda where the Fattoria del Colle is located.

INGREDIENTS FOR 4 PEOPLE

1,5KG of cauliflower, 4 ounces of Tuscan homemade bread, garlic, extra virgin olive oil, wine vinegar, salt and pepper

PREPARATION OF PAN LAVATO

First of all wash the cabbage, chop it coarsely and boil it with its leaves in salted water. …

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