Greek fasolada is a soup to sustain you during times both good and bad

“Difficult.” The word, especially when combined with “times,” has become shorthand for a host of adverse situations, from the personal (family conflict, grief, unemployment) to the collective (social unrest, economic upheaval, political division). When Shaily Lipa uses it in the introduction to a recipe in her new cookbook, she writes: “Greeks often credit this soup with helping people survive during difficult periods in history.”

In a Zoom interview from New York, where she is promoting “Yassou,” Lipa explains that she is referring to the times Greece has faced widespread poverty. (Two such stretches were after World War II and during the recession that started in 2007 and hurt the nation’s economy for many years after.)

The recipe she’s describing is fasolada, a soup of white beans and vegetables with a complex flavor that belies its simple preparation. “It’s not an expensive recipe,” she says. “Dried beans are so low-cost, and then there’s just vegetables and water.”

We’re not in a recession (at least not yet), but anxiety over the possibility of one makes this soup particularly appropriate. Difficult times, indeed.

Beyond its economic appeal, the soup has so much else going for it: The beans make it hearty, satisfying and nutritious. (“Yassou,” after all, translates to “to your health,” a greeting and toast that encapsulates the Greek priority of connection and celebration at the table.) The overall ease of preparation also means it won’t take up much precious mental energy or time that probably needs to be devoted to something even more pressing than dinner.

Greek food is made for such moments, really. Most of the nation’s classic dishes, the focus of “Yassou,” use a small number of ingredients and take little hands-on effort. Vegetables star pretty much throughout the book, with an entire chapter that stuffs them and another one that turns them into fried bites and savory pastries. Chapters on mezze and soups are predominantly vegetarian, with the meat and seafood corralled mostly into the mains. That reflects the traditional — if not the modern — Greek diet, Lipa tells me. “Until the ’50s, they ate meat once a week because it was so expensive,” she says. “Mostly they ate vegetables, grains and legumes.”

Those legumes are part of the famed Mediterranean diet that also contributes to the longevity featured in the “Blue Zones” research. Gigantes are my favorite Greek bean — one of my favorite beans, period — but featured in the fasolada are smaller white beans, such as cannellini or navy.

The dish is so beloved, especially during the colder months, that it is sometimes called the national food of the Greeks, even more so than the famed salad, tzatziki or souvlaki. “Today, in monasteries open to the public,” Lipa writes, “visitors may be treated to a bowl of fasolada, often served with a slice of bread and wine made by the monks or nuns.”

Greece, like so many other places, has been subject to many culinary influences, especially by people who ruled over at least part of the land for centuries each: the Venetians and the Ottomans. Lipa’s own family bears the marks of such influence; her grandparents are Greek on her father’s side and Turkish on her mother’s.

“Yassou” is Lipa’s 12th book, her first in English and first aimed at an American market; the previous 11 were in Hebrew and published in Israel, where she lives. Her Greek grandmother, she writes, was the biggest influence on her own culinary education, which has been going “as long as I can remember.”

While the book celebrates Greek classics in their unadulterated glory, Lipa does make some little-but-important tweaks here and there. In the fasolada, she breaks with the tradition of cooking the beans separately before adding the vegetables. Instead, she takes inspiration from the Italian technique of soffritto (the Venetian influence, perhaps?) and sautees the aromatics in olive oil first, creating a rich, concentrated flavor base that the beans absorb as they cook.

I’ve made it that way — it’s delicious — but also loved it when I used canned beans, my own break from tradition. In difficult times, we all appreciate a shortcut. Yassou!

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Fasolada (Greek White Bean Soup)

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling

1 small yellow onion (6 ounces), cut into ¼-inch dice

1 medium carrot, cut into ¼-inch dice

1 celery rib, cut into ¼-inch dice

3 garlic cloves, chopped

3½ cups water

Two (15-ounce) cans no-salt-added cannellini or navy beans, with their liquid

1 cup canned no-salt-added crushed tomatoes

2 bay leaves

1 teaspoon fine salt, plus more to taste

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, plus more to taste

½ teaspoon dried oregano

¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (optional)

¼ cup finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice, plus more to taste

In a Dutch oven or large saucepan over medium heat, heat the oil until shimmering. Add the onion, carrot, celery and garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are soft, about 8 minutes.

Add the water, beans (with their liquid), tomatoes, bay leaves, salt, black pepper, oregano and red pepper flakes, if using, and stir to combine. Bring to a lively simmer and cook, uncovered, until the liquid thickens and the flavors meld, about 20 minutes.

Add the parsley and lemon juice, and stir to combine. Taste, and season with more salt, black pepper and lemon juice, if desired.

Discard the bay leaves. Ladle the soup into bowls, drizzle with a little more oil and serve hot.

Servings: 4 (makes about 7 cups)

Note: Whatever you do, don’t skip the lemon and parsley at the end; they are a big part of what makes this soup taste special. If you’d like, crumble feta on top before serving with crusty bread.

Substitutions: For cannellini beans, use navy beans, Great Northern beans or borlotti (cranberry) beans. The soup has a mild spice level, but to make it more or less spicy, use more or less (or no) crushed red pepper flakes.

Variations: If you’d like to cook the beans for this recipe, soak 1 cup dried beans overnight and then add them instead of the cooked beans. Increase the water to 4 cups. Once you’ve added the other ingredients, cover and cook on low heat until the beans are tender, 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes, then proceed with the rest of the recipe. If the soup seems too thin, continue cooking it, uncovered, until it thickens to the consistency you like. To make this from dried beans in an Instant Pot or other multicooker, use the SAUTE (HIGH) function to cook the aromatics, then add 1 cup (soaked) dried beans, 4 cups water and the remaining ingredients. Cook on HIGH for 30 minutes, then manually release the pressure, check to see if the beans are tender and cook again for 5 minutes at a time, until the beans are very tender. If the soup seems too thin, return the multicooker to SAUTE and reduce the soup until it thickens to the consistency you’d like.

Nutritional information per serving (1 3/4 cups): 264 calories, 8 g fat, 1 g saturated fat, 37 g carbohydrates, 651 mg sodium, 0 mg cholesterol, 11 g protein, 11 g fiber, 6 g sugar.

— Adapted from “Yassou” by Shaily Lipa (Artisan Books, 2025)