Escarole Soup

We had this for dinner last night and it was darn good. The Lord of the Manor always cooks it because his buddy Emil gave him the recipe and, uh, I don't know why, but it's always been that way. So I tidied the kitchen and got out the ingredients and he cooked it.

Here is what you need to make it: one head of escarole, three cans of chicken broth, two cans of white beans, and some garlic and some olive oil. You also need some Parmesan cheese and red pepper flakes for garnish, and two pans: a saute pan and a soup pan.

Here is what escarole looks like before you cook it. It basically looks like thick green lettuce but it tastes rather bitter.

Here's the recipe:

Mince and warm 8 cloves of garlic in 3T olive oil in the saute pan for about 5 minutes. You don't want to brown it, you merely want to flavor the olive oil.

Meanwhile, pour the broth into the soup pan, bring to a simmer, and coarsely cut the escarole into pieces.

Now put the two cans of beans and their liquid into the garlic pan and just keep warm. You don't want to overcook the beans because they will go all mushy.

Put the escarole into the broth and simmer covered for 15 minutes or so until the escarole turns dark green and gets tender.

When the escarole is tender, pour the beans into it and stir to mix thoroughly.

Now put into a fancy tureen (or just plop the pan on the table like we did) and serve with grated Parmesan cheese and red pepper flakes. Delicious!