Vegetable Soup from powershealth.com
Adding More Veggies To Your Menu
We’ve all heard of various attempts to add more veggies to our daily food choices.
From proponents of “Meatless Mondays” to those who advocate being a “Vegan Until 6PM” or others who whip up Smoothies with lots of hidden veggies, tips abound on how to try to increase your daily consumption of vegetables.
Many of the tips are tried and true and could have been uttered by our grandmothers.
It is that kind of tip that I am resurrecting today.
Benefits of Soup
There are lots of benefits to making a large pot of soup, in this case, Vegetable Soup, and they aren’t just health benefits.
Whether you live alone or you have a family to feed, having some homemade soup in the fridge is a great option for many reasons.
Soup can easily be taken to work or school in a thermos.
Soup makes a quick and healthy after work/school snack.
Soup can be used as an appetizer or a complete meal.
Flavors and taste improve after a couple of days.
For added texture or variety, a side of long grain rice, quinoa, or whole wheat pasta can be added to a bowl for a different experience from day to day.
The American Cancer Society and the American Heart Association recommend eating 8-10 servings of fruit and vegetables a day. A bowl or 2 of Vegetable Soup can help you reach that goal.
Vegetable Soup also helps with weight loss by helping to fill you up. And it’s a great
Detox tool filled with antioxidants and immune boosting nutrients.
The list of benefits is endless as are the possibilities for making a tasty soup!
Many people have asked for my recipe over the years so I am including it here.
This works well as a base to which you can add any variety of more veggies.
Or use it “as is” for a flavorful, healthy dish that gets better and better every day.
Vegetable Soup
Ingredients:
1 large onion diced
2 stalks of leeks, finely chopped. Use both white and green parts of the leeks.
2 tsps chopped garlic
1 8oz package mushrooms, chopped.
2-3 stalks of celery, chopped.
3-4 carrots, sliced.
1 small to medium rutabaga, peeled and chopped.
6 cups of vegetable broth
1 28oz can of diced tomatoes.(Make sure there is no added sugar)
2 small green zucchini squash, chopped.
2 small yellow squash, chopped.
2 large bay leaves
1 Tbsp Thyme
2 Tbsp Sun Dried Tomato paste
Directions
Heat olive oil in large soup pot and cook onions till golden.
Add chopped leeks. Make sure they are soaked well to remove all dirt.Cook until soft.
Add chopped mushrooms and garlic and cook until soft.
Add chopped celery, carrots and rutabaga. I let this cook down a bit to the browning stage. This adds more flavor to the soup.
Add vegetable broth and the can of diced tomatoes. Scrape up the browning off the bottom of the pan to mix in with the broth.
Add chopped zucchini and squash, bay leaves, Thyme and Sun Dried Tomato Paste.
Cook for about 20 minutes and check vegetables for “doneness”. Stop cooking when vegetables are still firm but cooked through.
Add sea salt and grated pepper to taste.
Turn off heat and serve. Flavors will blend as the soup cools and sits in the fridge. This soup always tastes better the next day!
I like to keep some cooked quinoa or some Dreamfields pasta at the ready to toss into a bowl of soup if I am looking for a meal replacement. Otherwise, I enjoy the soup “as is” with a salad or as an afternoon snack to tide me over till dinner.
The possibilities are endless for this great “go to” dish.
If Minestrone is one of your favorites check out my recipe for Harvest Minestrone Soup with Quinoa and Kale.
And remember! “You don’t have to eat less! You just have to eat right!”
