Did the usual Saturday, lunch out and grocery shopping. To keep our sanity, DH and I split up. He's pretty aimless where food and grocery is concerned. He loves the beer, junk food and fruit - everything else is up to me.
:eyeroll: If somebody can teach me how to make a cursor eye-roll, I'll be grateful. (Thanks, LuckyRobin!) I've been going through the eyeroll phase lately.
Anyhow, DH requested minestone soup, so while he took the aimless route, I picked up the produce and Italian sausage and found tuna for .50/can. Lately that's been a good price, so I stocked up a bit. I filled two large, heavy grocery bags for $21.
With the snow and ice, it was a great time to make the deluxe version of minestrone soup. This isn't diet food, particularly.
3 Italian sausage, sliced. Love the hot stuff!
2 medium yellow onions, chopped
5 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 stalks celery, finely sliced
2 carrots, sliced in discs
1 qt turkey stock or 2 cans chicken stock
2 14.5 oz cans diced tomato (fresh roma tomatoes)
1 14.5 oz can tomato sauce
1/3 head of cabbage, sliced thinly and chopped (what I had on hand)
1 zucchini, chopped
3 medium white potatoes, diced
1.5 c chickpeas, soaked for at least an hour (lentils work here, too)
green beans - I used frozen
1 head fresh parsley, chopped
1/2 cup orzo pasta
olive oil
parmesian cheese heel
bay leaf, thyme, margoram, salt, pepper
water
Soak chickpeas, then boil until soften. I remove the outer skins; it prevents "colon reverb". Set aside.
In stock pot (I think mine's a 10 qt), add a couple tablespoons olive oil, and saute sliced sausage, onion, garlic, bay leaf, thyme, margoram, celery, carrot until veg is soft and sausage is brown.
Add turkey stock, diced tomato, all the other vegetables, chickpeas, parsley and water to about 3/4 of stock pot. Low simmer for about 1 hr. Taste and correct for salt, seasoning, consistency, etc. If soup is too thick, add water.
Add orzo and parmesian cheese heel. Simmer until orzo is done - about 15 minutes.
Timing is very forgiving, and the vegetables are really whatever you have in whatever form you have them in - fresh and frozen's better than canned.
The cheese heel really makes it for me. When DH and I buy (or are gifted) cheese, we usually save the heel aka the rind aka the cheese closest to the label. Don't put the label in - you lose the gourmet effect.
The deluxe minestrone
January 14th, 2007 at 03:30 am
January 14th, 2007 at 03:39 am 1168745955
thanks!
January 14th, 2007 at 04:09 am 1168747792
January 14th, 2007 at 05:34 am 1168752897
January 14th, 2007 at 02:38 pm 1168785520
as for the rolleyes, this is the closest i've got =/
January 16th, 2007 at 02:17 am 1168913857
January 19th, 2007 at 03:00 pm 1169218859