"This soup was such a bit hit for Christmas dinner. We were very casual this year with beef sandwiches and the winter minestrone soup to compliment the sandwiches. For anyone who has complained of the rosemary sprigs in the soup, I have a suggestion. I wrapped my rosemary sprigs in cheesecloth and let that cook in the soup simply for the flavor. Then you just take out the herbs, all of which remain in the cheesecloth. This gave us all of the wonderful flavor of the rosemary with none of the chewy pieces inside of the soup. I did use a thicker cut of bacon as a substitute for the pancetta because of the cost, and I used spinach instead of the swiss chard because I couldn't find any in the local markets. Also, Whole Foods sells just the parmesan rinds. I bought 3 good size pieces for under $3. Looking forward to the leftovers for dinner today.

"This soup was such a bit hit for Christmas dinner. We were very casual this year with beef sandwiches and the winter minestrone soup to compliment the sandwiches. For anyone who has complained of the rosemary sprigs in the soup, I have a suggestion. I wrapped my rosemary sprigs in cheesecloth and let that cook in the soup simply for the flavor. Then you just take out the herbs, all of which remain in the cheesecloth. This gave us all of the wonderful flavor of the rosemary with none of the chewy pieces inside of the soup. I did use a thicker cut of bacon as a substitute for the pancetta because of the cost, and I used spinach instead of the swiss chard because I couldn't find any in the local markets. Also, Whole Foods sells just the parmesan rinds. I bought 3 good size pieces for under $3. Looking forward to the leftovers for dinner today.

"My family loved this! I had to make a couple of adjustments because of the ingredients that I had on hand. I subbed diced canned tomatoes seasoned with basil & garlic for the cherry tomatoes and I had to used grated parm for the cheese! It was really good. I made two pounds of pasta and there was just enough left for lunch the next day. I will definitely make this again. A pretty budget friendly recipe.