Florentine Specialties

La Pappa al pomodoro (Tomato soup)
This dish is very simple and belongs to the best Florentine tradition. The flavours of fresh basil and tomatoes turn a simple ingredient such as bread into a real specialty.
Ingredients: 1 kg of ripe tomatoes, 350 gr. of stale bread, 1,5 lt. of light broth, 4 garlic cloves, a lot of basil, 100 gr. of extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper.
Wash the tomatoes, chop them and remove the seeds, then cook on a medium flame; when they are cooked, sieve them. Cut the stale bread into thin slices and toast them in the oven. Heat the broth and then add the tomato cream, the bread slices, oil, garlic (finely chopped), the basil leaves (entire), salt and pepper. Cook until the liquid has almost completely evaporated, stirring frequently so that the bread becomes soft and creamy. This soup can be served hot or cold, with a drop of Tuscan extra virgin olive oil.

La ribollita (Typical Tuscan soup)
The Ribollita is certainly one of the most known dishes in the Tuscan food tradition. It is a very humble meal, whose origins are to be found in the poor peasants' households, where the vegetables leftovers were re-cooked with stale bread, adding some olive oil after cooking, to make them more tasty.
Ingredients: one tuft of curly kale (cavolo nero), 1/4 of cabbage, a bunch of beets, 1 leek, 1 onion, 2 potatoes, 2 carrots, 2 courgettes, 2 celery stalks, 300 gr. of cannellini beans, 2 peeled tomatoes, extra-virgin olive oil, 250 gr. of home-made stale bread, salt and pepper.
Soak the beans for about 8 hours, boil them in 2 litres of water. Fry the sliced onion in olive oil, add in sequence all the other vegetables, coarsely chopped, and let them soften for about 10 minutes. Add the beans cooking water and half of the beans. Sieve the other half and add them to the soup. Add salt and pepper to taste and cook for about two hours. Add the sliced bread, mix well and serve in earthenware bowls with a drop of extra-virgin olive oil, strictly Tuscan.