Minestrone alla Genovese

Every region of Italy has its minestrone, and each insists its version is the true one. They are all correct and all wrong. Minestrone is not a recipe but a principle: vegetables, beans, liquid, time. What separates Genoa's minestrone from all the others is one ingredient added at the end.

The pesto arrives off the heat, stirred into the finished soup or spooned into each bowl. It must never boil. When the hot broth meets the cold basil paste, the perfume rises immediately. Pine nuts, garlic, Parmigiano, basil, the finest Ligurian olive oil: everything that makes pesto Genovese what it is now transforms this soup into something that could only come from one place on earth.

The vegetables should be summer vegetables if you are making this in summer: zucchini at their smallest, green beans so fresh they snap, tomatoes warm from the vine. In winter, use heartier greens and root vegetables. The Genovese understand that minestrone follows the seasons. What remains constant is the pesto at the end, the bright green swirl that announces where this soup was born.