Vegan Minestrone with Miso Pesto by Noah Galuten

There is a Provençal vegetable soup, “au pistou,” that is something of a French classic—in which a usually mild broth gets livened up at the very end with a dollop of pistou placed onto each bowl.

This is a featured recipe from The Don’t Panic Pantry Cookbook: Mostly Vegetarian Comfort Food That Happens to Be Pretty Good for You by this week’s guest, Noah Galuten. You can also hear our conversation with Noah here.

Excerpted with permission from The Don’t Panic Pantry Cookbook by Noah Galuten:

There is a Provençal vegetable soup, “au pistou,” that is something of a French classic—in which a usually mild broth gets livened up at the very end with a dollop of pistou (French pesto) placed onto each bowl. The fresh herbs, garlic, and grated cheese open up in the hot soup, perfuming the bowl and transforming the whole of the meal into something quite lively and comforting.

This recipe is my riff on that classic, making a simple bean and vegetable soup, but blatantly stealing the technique and swapping in vegan Miso-Spinach Pesto, with the miso taking its comfortable position as a broth enhancer, but emboldened here with nuts and herbs and greens.

In this recipe, I do not recommend a canned bean, as the dried ones will make for a much more flavorful broth (and bean). This also gives a long cook to the vegetables at the beginning, with the bright green crunch of lightly sautéed ones added at the end.