This will my final blog for a while. New obligations have come up in my life that won't allow me to keep blogging and get my requisite amount of sleep each night. Thanks to all the friends and strangers who have taken interest in my posts. It really does give me a warm fuzzy feeling.
I'll be back when the spirit takes me, though. Maybe when I come up with a recipe that's just too good not to share, or I have a corporate food rant that needs venting.
In any case, today I want to share a super simple winter soup recipe that I whipped up last week. I've been a little slack about menu planning lately, so I've had to come up with some quick meals on the fly. This one turned out to be a big success.
Italian in origins, this soup combines potatoes, cannelini (white kidney) beans and kale in one pot. Some dried herbs and canned tomatoes add flavor. It's a nutritional powerhouse (my first Currentmom blog ever was on the wonders of kale) and literally takes only fifteen minutes to make.
You know how they say you are either a rice, pasta or potato person? Well, I have definitely always been a rice person, with pasta and then potatoes a distant second and third. But potatoes, I've learned, are really delicious and easy to prepare, especially in soup, and pack a healthy does of vitamin C, potassium and fiber. And they give this soup a good heartiness, while their starches thicken it up a bit.
So, give this one a try. Serve it was some yummy bread to soak up broth and don't be afraid to make it your own. You can use regular kidney beans instead of cannelini, although the effect isn't quite the same. And any kind of dark, leafy greens would do.
Potato, Kale and Cannelini Soup (Serves 4)
What you need:
2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped or pressed
Dried or fresh rosemary and thyme, to taste
3 medium potatoes (not baking), chopped into bite-sized pieces
1 15 oz can cannelini beans, not drained
1 15 oz can chopped tomatoes, not drained
1 bunch kale, stripped from stems and chopped
1-3 c vegetable broth or water
Salt and pepper to taste
Splash of Tabasco (optional)
What to do:
Saute the onions in olive oil over medium heat until translucent. Add garlic and dried herbs and cook, stirring, for one minute. Add potatoes and cook, stirring, for another minute.
Dump in beans, tomatoes and chopped kale. Add vegetable broth and water to reach desired thickness. Sprinkle in salt, pepper and Tabasco to taste.
Simmer until potatoes are tender, about ten minutes. Serve with bread.
Buon appetito!
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