As the winter nights draw in and Jack Frost nibbles at your nose, there's nothing quite like a bowl of good home-made soup to help you embrace the season with a smile on your face! What makes this particular minestrone soup even better is that the recipe uses a lot of seasonal winter vegetables which are plentiful at the moment. As a dish served throughout Italy, minestrone has no particular set recipe, so you can use whatever vegetables you have lying around if you can't find the ones on Mama's list!

For an extra treat, add a little grated Parmesan cheese on top and serve with an Italian-style bread such as ciabatta, for a warming winter meal. Before we get started, here's Mama's house rules again:

Mama’s Tips for cooking at home:

- Make sure you have a grown-up with you when trying these recipes out. Have them read through the recipes first and help you with anything that might be difficult or dangerous.
- Always wash your hands before starting any cooking.
- If you wear an apron, you won’t get so messy while cooking.
- Remember to clean up after you’ve finished cooking! Just like Mama!


Ingredients

1 onion, chopped
1 celery, sliced
1 leek, chopped
8 cups water
3 carrots, diced
4 vegetable stock cubes
1 turnip, diced
3 big potatoes, diced
1/4 cabbage, shredded
1 cup frozen peas
1/2 cup spaghetti
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1 tin butter beans
1 small tin tomato puree


Directions

1) Fry the onions until they are glassy.

2) Add the leeks, carrots, turnip, cabbage,
celery and fry until they appear wilted.

3) Dissolve the vegetable stock cubes
in the eight cups of water and pour
over, then cook on a medium heat until
the vegetables are cooked.

4) Add the potatoes and cook for another 10 minutes.

5) Add the beans, parsley and spaghetti and
cook until the spaghetti is ready (refer
to cooking time on the spaghetti pack).

6) Serve, but be careful to let it cool down a bit first!