Ribollita is a Tuscan soup made with cavolo nero (Tuscan kale), cannellini beans, seasonal vegetables and stale bread. It is made one day and reheated the next: this second boiling, which gives it its name (“reboiled”), thickens it and brings the flavours together. The result is a dense soup you can almost eat with a fork.
In this article you’ll find the original Tuscan ribollita recipe for 6 people, with ingredients and quantities, how to cook dried beans, a step-by-step method, the reboiling technique and the most common variations.
Recipe card
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| Prep time | 40 minutes |
| Cooking time | 3 hours (beans 1 hour 30 minutes, soup 1 hour, reboiling 30 minutes) |
| Resting time | 24 hours (12 for soaking the beans, overnight rest for the soup) |
| Total time | About 28 hours, 24 of which resting |
| Difficulty | Medium |
| Servings | 6 people |
| Course | First course, soup |
| Cuisine | Tuscan |
| Cooking method | In a pot, on the stove |
Ingredients for 6 people
- 300 g dried cannellini beans (or 750 g cooked cannellini)
- 1 bunch cavolo nero (about 300 g)
- 1/4 savoy cabbage (about 300 g)
- 200 g Swiss chard
- 2 medium potatoes (about 300 g)
- 1 red onion, plus one to serve, optional
- 2 carrots
- 2 celery stalks
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste (30 g)
- 300 g stale Tuscan bread
- 80 ml extra virgin olive oil, plus extra to serve
- 2 sprigs thyme (ideally pepolino, wild thyme, if you can find it)
- Fine salt and black pepper, to taste
Cavolo nero. It is the defining ingredient of ribollita. The best leaves are those picked after the first frosts, more tender and sweet: that’s why it’s a late-autumn and winter dish. The tough central rib must be removed.
The beans. Dried cannellini, cooked slowly, give a tastier and creamier soup than canned beans. Part of them is puréed to thicken the broth.
How to make Tuscan ribollita
- Soak the beans. The evening before, rinse the beans and leave them in plenty of cold water for 12 hours.
- Cook the beans. Drain them, put them in a pot with 2 litres of cold water and bring to the boil. Cook over low heat, with the lid slightly ajar, for about 1 hour 30 minutes, until tender. Salt only at the end of cooking. Keep the cooking water.
- Purée half the beans. Blend or pass half the beans through a food mill with a ladle of their cooking water, until creamy.
- Make the soffritto. Chop the onion, carrots and celery. In a large pot, heat the oil and soften the vegetables over medium-low heat for 10 minutes. Add the tomato paste dissolved in a ladle of bean water and cook for 2 minutes.
- Add the vegetables. Remove the ribs from the cavolo nero and cut the leaves into strips. Cut the savoy cabbage and chard into strips too, and the potatoes into cubes. Add everything to the soffritto and let it cook for 10 minutes, stirring.
- Cook the soup. Add the bean purée and the cooking water, enough to cover the vegetables by 2-3 cm. Add the thyme, season with salt and pepper and cook over low heat for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Add the whole beans in the last 10 minutes.
- Add the bread. Cut the bread into thin slices. In a pot, alternate layers of bread and soup, finishing with soup. Leave to rest for 15 minutes, then stir: the bread will break down into the soup. Let it cool and rest in the fridge overnight.
- Reboil the soup. The next day, put the ribollita back on the heat with a drizzle of oil and warm it over low heat for 20-30 minutes, stirring often and without adding liquid, until thick and piping hot. Serve with raw extra virgin olive oil, pepper and, if you like, a few thin slices of red onion.
History and tradition of ribollita
Ribollita began as a peasant dish: a soup of bread, vegetables and pulses, without meat, made in large quantities and reheated over the following days. More than a precise recipe, the name describes a method: putting an already-made soup back on the heat, often prepared with whatever the winter garden offered.
Bread and cabbage soups already appear in Tuscan recipe books between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and at the end of the nineteenth century Pellegrino Artusi included in his book a meatless Tuscan peasant-style soup with bread, cavolo nero and beans. The name “ribollita”, however, came into use later and, according to some accounts, originated in restaurants.
Being a home-cooked dish, ribollita has many family and local versions, all considered traditional: the vegetables, the presence of tomato and the herbs vary.
Practical tips
- Don’t skip the rest. Ribollita made and served on the same day is a good bread and vegetable soup, but it doesn’t yet have its characteristic dense texture.
- Don’t salt the beans straight away. Salt at the start of cooking slows down the softening of the skins: add it in the last 10 minutes.
- Use unsalted bread. Unsalted Tuscan bread breaks down evenly and doesn’t make the soup too salty.
- Stir often while reboiling. The soup is thick and tends to stick to the bottom: use a heavy-bottomed pot and low heat.
- Adjust the thickness with the bean water. If after resting the soup is too stiff to reheat, add a ladle of the bean cooking water, not plain water.
Variations and storage
Variations
The vegetables change from home to home: some add leek, courgettes, cauliflower or canned tomatoes instead of tomato paste. Around Florence, wild thyme, called pepolino, is often added at the end of cooking. Out of season, when cavolo nero isn’t available, curly kale can be used, bearing in mind the flavour will be different.
A common practice in many trattorias is to pan-fry the previous day’s ribollita with a drizzle of oil until a light crust forms on the bottom.
Storage
Ribollita keeps in the fridge, in a closed container, for 3 days, and gets thicker each time it is reheated. It can be frozen in portions for 2-3 months: thaw it in the fridge and reheat it over low heat with a drizzle of oil.
Frequently asked questions about ribollita
Can I use canned beans?
Yes, if you’re short of time: you’ll need about 750 g of cooked cannellini, well rinsed. Use water or vegetable broth instead of the bean cooking water and still purée half the beans to thicken. The flavour will be less full, but the structure of the recipe stays the same.
Why is it called ribollita?
Because it is eaten after being boiled a second time. The soup is made one day, left to rest and reheated the next: with the reboiling, the bread absorbs the liquid, the soup thickens and the flavours come together. Traditionally it could even be reheated several times.
Does ribollita contain tomato?
It depends on the family tradition. Many recipes use a little tomato paste or a few canned tomatoes, which add colour and a slightly tangy note; others use none at all. Either way, the tomato should stay in the background: ribollita is not a tomato soup.
What is the difference between ribollita and bread soup?
Bread soup (minestra di pane) is the freshly made soup, with the bread added at the end. Ribollita is the same soup left to rest and reheated the next day, denser and more compact. In many Tuscan homes, the two names refer to two different moments of the same dish.
More Tuscan soups with bread
Ribollita belongs to the same family as pappa al pomodoro, the summer soup of bread and tomato, and shares with fagioli all’uccelletto the use of cannellini beans, a staple of Tuscan cooking. To discover these recipes in the kitchen with a chef, the cooking classes at Orto San Frediano in Florence are dedicated to traditional dishes.
