Christine replied:

>> I'm going to make minestrone this coming Wednesday night instead,
>> provided the nights are still chilly here.
>>
>
> Oh, great!!!
>
> Let us know how it turns out...

Here's what the "Silver Palate" ladies wrote about minestrone in _The New
Basics Cookbook_:

"Minestrone, the quintessential Italian vegetable soup, varies from region
to region throughout that country. In Milan it is made with rice and peas
(not beans), in Genoa pesto is added, in Florence the beans are cooked
separately and half of them puréed to thicken the soup, and in southern
Italy minestrone is based on garlic."

"While we generally serve minestrone as a hot first course, in Italy, in the
summertime, we've enjoyed it at room temperature. In any season, though, it
must be served with freshly grated Parmesan."

Since Lin likes her soups to be thick, I'm leaning toward the Florentine
method. I plan to loosely follow Marcella Hazan's recipe from _Essentials of
Classic Italian Cooking_, but thicken the soup with bean purée as noted
above, and add a mixture of carrot juice and V-8 before serving. The recipe
calls for either brodo (made from beef, veal, and chicken) or beef broth; I
plan to use a mixture of chicken stock and trotter broth. Also, since Lin is
a big fan of French onion soup, I'll probably do some kind of cheesy crouton
on top rather than simply adding microplaned Parmesan. Or maybe I'll do that
for *her* and put a dollop of pesto or tapenade into mine instead.

Bob