Pressure Cooker Ribollita
Ribollita is a hearty Tuscan soup loaded with vegetables, beans and crusty whole grain bread. This Pressure Cooker Ribollita cuts the cook time from over 6 hours to about an hour and a half.
I recently attended a food blogger conference, Everything Food Conference, and Andie Mitchell was a Keynote Speaker. Andie has a popular food blog and is a best selling author. Her memoir, It Was Me All Along, shares her inspiring journey to lose 135 pounds.
Since I’d be hanging out with Andie and her memoir has been on my reading list for a long time, I decided to buy her memoir and her cookbook, Eating in the Middle: A Mostly Wholesome Cookbook.
I’m so glad I did. The memoir is charming and well written, and it’s a great cookbook. I love the concept of the cookbook. That life shouldn’t be a constant diet and no food is permanently off the table. The recipes are “mostly wholesome with a sprinkling of decadence.”
Making Ribollita in an Instant Pot
An Instant Pot is one of the most popular brands of electric pressure cookers. They are easy to use and your Instant Pot can help you create this delicious Ribollita!
My Pressure Cooker Ribollita is adapted from the stove top Ribollita recipe in the cookbook. I’d never eaten Ribolitta before and wasn’t sure what to expect, but my family loved it. It’s a flavorful, hearty, thick soup.
My husband wasn’t sure he’d like the bread simmered in the soup, but it gave the soup sort of a cream texture without a drop of cream. He said I should definitely make this one again. Which is high praise from him.
What about you? Have you eaten Ribollita before?
Ingredients
- 1/2 pound dried cannellini beans rinsed and drained
- 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 medium yellow onion chopped (about 1 cup)
- 2 medium carrots chopped (about 1 1/4 cups)
- 2 celery stalks chopped (about 1 1/4 cups)
- 4 garlic cloves minced
- 1 15- ounce can crushed tomatoes
- 4 14.5 ounce cans low-sodium chicken broth
- 1 bay leaf
- 2 fresh sage leaves
- 2 sprigs fresh thyme leaves
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 5 ounce package baby Kale leaves or chopped Lacinato kale
- 8 slices day-old crusty whole-grain bread torn into 1-inch pieces (about 4 cups)
- 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Instructions
- Add beans and 4 cups water to the pressure cooking pot. Select High Pressure and 1 minute cook time. When timer sounds, turn pressure cooker off and allow pressure to release naturally for 1 hour. Drain beans in a colander, discarding water.
- Select Browning/Sauté and add oil, onion, carrots, and celery. Sauté, stirring occasionally until tender, about 3 minutes. Add garlic and sauté 1 minute more.
- Add tomatoes, 2 cans broth, bay leaf, sage, thyme, and black pepper and stir to combine. Add drained beans and kale on top and don’t stir.
- Lock lid in place, select High Pressure and 5 minutes cook time. When timer sounds, turn off pressure cooker and allow pressure to release naturally for 10 minutes, then do a quick pressure release. Remove bay leaf and thyme stems.
- Stir in remaining 2 cans of broth and bread. Select Simmer/Sauté and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring frequently.
- Ladle the soup into bowls and top each with 1 tablespoon Parmesan cheese.
Notes
More pressure cooker soups you might like:
Pressure Cooker Vegetable Beef and Rice Soup, Pressure Cooking Today
Pressure Cooker Garden Minestrone, Pressure Cooking Today
Pressure Cooker Tomato Basil Parmesan Soup, Pressure Cooking Today
Instant Pot Low-Carb Taco Soup, Kalyn’s Kitchen
Instant Pot Lentil Soup with Sweet Potato, Cookin’ Canuck
Great recipe and I appreciate you calling out for *dried* beans instead of the canned that so many others specify. Why, oh why, would anyone with a PC be using canned beans when it’s so quick and easy to use dried beans? Anyway my goal is to make Ribollita like the one I get here at Publican Quality Meats where they also add their house-made cotechino. Delicious! I prefer topping the soup with the larger curls that come from “shaving” the cheese vs the smaller bits that come from grating. IMO it’s a richer taste when you get some cheese in your spoonful and a more pleasant presentation.
Thank for sharing Karl. I hope you enjoy the recipe.
Fantastic! I only had canned beans, so I used them and skipped the first step. I also halved the recipe, as the soup is just for me.
Otherwise, I followed the recipe as written, using Rotel diced tomatoes, homemade chicken stock, leftover crusty French bread. I discovered ribollita when traveling in Italy years ago, and this recipe matches what I had there (although no two bowls of ribollita were ever the same).
How fun to have eaten it in Italy. Thanks!
Can this be pressure canned after cooking?
If so what setting and how long please? I’m in high altitude (4200) so I add ten minutes.
Thank you.
Hi Nanette – I’m sorry, I don’t have any experience with pressure canning. The Utah State extension service https://extension.usu.edu/canning/ has lots of resources.
Looks great! Think I could add some chunks of stew meat? If so, any guess on adjustments I’d have to make? Thanks so much!!
You’d probably want to cook the stew meat for 18 minutes before starting with the rest of the recipe – similarly to this recipe https://www.pressurecookingtoday.com/beef-stroganoff-pressure-cooker/
Just made for me and my little family ! Grazie mille !
This is great. Even though I miss understood the directions and pre soaked and pre cooked the beans this soup was very tasty and everyone in the family liked it.
Thanks Rachelle! Good to know it’s a forgiving soup 🙂 Glad it was a hit with the family.
Thank you so much for this recipe – I love Ribollita! The recipe I’ve been using for years used canned beans, beef broth and had bacon in it but otherwise the basic ingredients are the same as yours. Such a hearty – and heartwarming – soup. Making it in the IP means I’m going to make it much more often.
This soup is fantastic! So healthy and so flavorful! It will be a favorite at our house. Thank you for the great recipe.
In step #1 are the beans only cooked foe 1 minute then soaked for 1 hour?
Hi Carol – yes, that’s correct. You only pressure cook them 1 minute, then soak / natural pressure release for 1 hour.
This looks great! Did you use sliced bread (we like Pepperidge Farm 15-grain), or something you would get from the bakery, like the shape of a baguette where you slice it yourself?
Thanks Janna – I used La Brea Bakery Whole Grain bread that they sale at my local market https://www.facebook.com/labreabakery/photos/a.10150840410844502.513441.82817739501/10155766139944502/?type=3&theater. It’s more a crusty baguette style than sliced bread.
I’ve never had this soup but always thought it sounded wonderful and I love the idea of a pressure cooker version1
That’s my kind of soup! Love the idea of adding bread to thicken it too. I’ve never had this exact soup but my Nana who lived with us when I was growing up (100% Italian-she came by boat to the United States from Milan Italy as a teenager) used to make all kinds of soup-using no recipe of course. She would take whatever was in the cabinet and refrigerator that needed used, cook it up and it tasted like a million dollars. She’d call it “Minestra”-the more goodies in it the better. Pinning this one to try for sure….I’ll tell Bob the kale is spinach…shhhhhhhh… 😉