Hearty Vegetable Soup

Last month we celebrated my husband's birthday with lunch at an Italian restaurant that served a take home entree in addition to the one you ordered and ate at the table.  It was a drizzly and dreary day, a good day for a hearty vegetable soup.  The waiter thought that was an excellent selection, too.

The soup was delicious.  There were so many vegetables in the soup.  I jokingly told Stephen, our waiter, that I would like to have the recipe.  In a few minutes, he came back with a listing of ingredients!  The following vegetables were included on his list:  Onions, garlic, carrots, celery, cabbage, green beans, basil, tomatoes, spinach, zucchini, kidney beans, and Northern beans.  Pasta was also added to the soup.

I modified the recipe based on my harvest from the garden and what I had available:  I chopped sweet onions and a clove of garlic.  I chopped carrots and celery.

From the garden, I chopped string beans, a medium sized leaf of Georgia collard and a leaf of red cabbage.  I had one lonely sweet potato that I brought in some time ago and didn't know what to do with until now.  Chop, chop.  I still have green peppers coming in--chop, chop.

I cooked the vegetables in chicken broth, a mix of home made and from cubes.  I also opened a can of Northern beans and added them to the pot.   I had dried Chinese seaweed that I also added. I picked some sweet basil, oregano, and rosemary from my herb garden and tossed them into the pot, too.

After I served my husband this soup with toast and cheese, I still had soup left over.  I could add cooked pasta and kidney beans to this soup.  This is a nutritious soup with many possibilities.  For your information, the kitchen sink is still in place and free of dirty dishes.

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