Minestrone Soup With a Twist.

Hi y’all!  Today was a really cool day here that I decided to make soup.  I made minestrone soup with a twist.  What is the twist, you ask?  I added some meatballs to it!  

Here are all the ingredients I used for the soup.  Actually, except for the macaronis.  I didn’t have room for them! lol  Anyway, I used:

two cans diced tomatoes, one can of garbanzo beans, one can of red kidney beans, one can of black beans, one can of green beans, some parsley, some basil leaves, a bag of matchstix carrots, celery, spinach, purple cabbage.

and a lot of canned beef broth.  I took the easy way out.  lol  You don’t have to use as much beef broth.  I have to make more than usual.  I’ll definitely have leftover soup for tomorrow.  :D 

Here are the meatballs I made. I added garlic salt, onion powder, and black pepper. to the meat.  I also added two eggs, and long grain rice.  I didn’t add too much rice though.  I thought about using brown rice but I it would probably take too long to cook so I added long grain white rice.  The meatballs are not big at all. 

After I made the meatballs, I placed them in boiling water.  I let them boil for about an hour.  After they were ready, I placed them in a bowl until I was ready to add them to my soup.  While the meatballs were boiling, I cut all of my veggies.  Spinach, cabbage, and celery.  The carrots didn’t need any further cutting.  I bought the matchstix type.

I placed all the veggies in the beef broth and let it boil and then I let it simmer for a while until the cabbage and celery were a bit soft. 

While the veggies were in the pot simmering, I opened all of the cans of the different beans and placed them in a strainer.  I rinsed them with water and let them drain.  That way I will get rid of the salt that they contain, kwim?   Look how pretty the beans look!  Beans are soo good for us!   

I also made cornbread. :)

I wish you could have smelled my house as all of this was simmering!   I used purple cabbage cause it has more nutrients than the green cabbage but you can use green cabbage if you’d like. :)

My kids got home and thought I had been cooking all day long.  hee hee   My twins love to eat soups.  They love their veggies.  My 11 yr old is another story.  *blush*  He decided to eat leftovers from yesterday. 

Well I hope you enjoyed my soup. :)

Sandra