This is my last soup to make in our quest to work our way through Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. It was an interesting one to end with. This soup comes from the Romagna area of Italy. Marcella says that their style of cooking tends to resemble the Bolognese style, but that they value lightness and delicacy more. Their simple soups are an example of this.
This soup starts with homemade meat broth. The recipe is given to us in the Fundamentals Section of the cookbook. It is a combination of a few simple vegetables like carrot, onion, celery, bell pepper, potato, and tomato. Those are cooked along with assorted beef, veal and chicken. You cook the broth for over 3 hours. I like that Marcella explains that this is a broth, not a stock.l It’s lighter and softer than the strong reductions you might find in some stocks.
Back to the soup. You bring the broth to a boil. As that’s coming to a boil, you mix together grated parmigiano-reggiano, dry breadcrumbs, nutmeg, lemon zest and eggs. This makes sort of a dough. Actually more the texture of polenta. That is forced through the large holes on a food mill into the boiling broth, and cooked for a couple of minutes. You then ladle the soup into bowls and serve with extra Parmesan.
The soup had good flavors. The nutmeg and lemon flavor came through nicely. It is definately all about using a good broth. It was very light and would be a nice light opener to a meal. While I enjoyed it, it’s not a soup that I would probably make again. It’s not that I didn’t like it, because I did. I just usually don’t eat soups as a starter, but love heavier, more filling soups that are my full meal.