This mother’s memory of her child is—at least in part– a history of meals, and I could have called this post ”Sam’s Life-in-Food Soup”. As a tot, my son loved both beans and soup. If they coincided (as they did in my father’s minestrone), so much the better. He was also a lettuce-lover from the get-go– and we were the envy of friends whose children wouldn’t touch anything green. In college, he developed a taste for heat and spice, and he returned from a semester in Rome an expert on Parmigiano-Reggiano. This soup is all about him and he eats it with that knowledge; but even if it isn’t all about you, it’s still a very good soup.