I feel as though my body (and mind!) are completely confused by life at the moment. The past few weeks have flown by, my last day of work is tomorrow, and our movers come MONDAY. Ever since getting back from Seattle, I’ve had trouble sleeping and the quickly approaching major life changes are beginning to settle in. I woke up last night from a dream where I was on an interior decorating class and I was remodeling my “reading nook”. Seriously, self? Seriously?
I blame Pinterest for this. I think I need a break from Pinterest for a week or two…in the name of sleep.
With the early spring, summer has been a bit confused this year. The Midwest has quickly alternated between 90 degree days and mid-60 degree days for the past several weeks. My tomato plants are completely and utterly confused…and not doing well. It probably doesn’t help that the 90 degree weather has not-so-conveniently been around when we are out of town leaving them thirsty beyond belief, I’m sure.
Regardless of what the summer brings weather-wise, soup is always a welcome addition to my menu. Plus, summer vegetables make for one excellent, healthy soup.
Unlike most every recipe that I snag and post from a cooking magazine or blog, this soup came about from a random Google search. It happened to be 60-something degree weather last week, and I had frozen corn, green beans, and peas that needed to be used up. A quick internet search later yielded this result, which was accompanied by rave reviews.
I had to make this recipe when Mr. Prevention was out of town because he’s one of those people who finds hot soup offensive in the warmer months. Lucky for me, this soup only got better on days 2 and 3 and I very happily downed 2 cups at a time.
Whether you’re a summer soup lover, or like to scavenge summer’s best veggies for later, this is a recipe to make. Outside of the fresh, in-season veggies, this soup is healthy to boot.
Coming in at 83 calories a cup, this soup offers up 3.5 grams of fiber and a respectable 309 milligrams of sodium. I enjoyed the hint of tumeric and tomato paste which really helped give the vegetable broth some depth. I am a sucker for vegetable soup and this one is a keeper.
Summer Vegetable Soup adapted from Food.com
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 small onion, quartered, sliced thin
6 cups reduced-sodium vegetable broth
1 small zucchini, halved length-wise and sliced
1 (15 1/2 oz) can navy beans, rinsed, drained
5 small red potatoes, diced
1 cup corn, fresh or frozen
1 cup peas, fresh or frozen
1 cup green beans, fresh or frozen, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 tomato, chopped
1/2 tsp ground pepper, plus more to taste
3/4 tsp salt, plus more to taste
1/8 tsp ground turmeric
2 Tbsp tomato paste
Directions:
In a large pot or dutch oven, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and saute until softened, about 3-4 minutes.
Add the next 11 ingredients, through tumeric.
Bring to a boil, then reduce heat, cover & simmer for about 25-30 minutes or until vegetables are tender.
Remove from heat; stir in tomato paste. Season with salt and pepper, to taste. Cover & let stand for 5 minutes before serving.
Yield: ~15 cups.
Nutrition Information (per cup): 83 calories; 1 g. fat; 0 mg. cholesterol; 309 mg. sodium; 15.8 g. carbohydrate; 3.5 g. fiber; 3.1 g. protein
Result: Packed with summer’s best veggies! Feel free to adapt this recipe to include your favorites. If you prefer a soup with more broth, plan to add several cups – this soup is chunky and plentiful in veggies. The original recipe called for sweet potato, but I doubled up on the red skin potatoes. I did use frozen veggies from last summer, but you can use fresh or store-bought frozen. To make a heavier meal or to please the carbaholic in your life, you can add pasta in the last 10-15 minutes of simmering. Enjoy!
I’m anxious for my hike + picnic with my students this afternoon. Now, what to bring…
Be well,
Ooh this looks good! Of course we’re having a massive heat wave for the foreseeable future so I’ll pray we get thrown a cold front bone somewhere in there so I can thoroughly enjoy this!
I can definitely get down with some veggie soup during the summer. Especially since we’ve had days in the 60s too.
Hope all your packing goes well this weekend!!
Lovely! I like soup in the middle of summer. Because I’m weird like that. Also chili- I like to keep my body guessing.
I love to make Ribollleta in the summer when all the veggies can be bought at the farm stand!
This looks perfect for summer! I need to make this soon.
I’m with you on Pintrest-I’ve found so many recipes I want to make (I made 7 recipes that weren’t meals last week because I was off and had a million pins!), things I make for school, and tons of books I want to read. It’s dangerous.
YUM! I don’t mind soup in the summer. I always am cold in our office during the summer, so warmer meals work out just fine. Love all the veggies!
Hope you can get some good rest soon!
I always love soup. I used to think I just couldn’t eat it in the summer, but I tried it a couple times and it turns out I don’t really care. Soup is always good
Except maybe when my house is 1000 degrees, but thankfully it stays pretty cool most of the summer even without AC. Love the summer veggies in this, and the flavors… Turmeric? Sounds good!
Your timing couldn’t be better. My mom sent me home with a bunch of homemade vegetable broth last night.
I haven’t gotten into pinterest yet – I’m avoiding it since I hardly have time for everything in my life now.
I am at least thankful that the temps dip back down to the 60′s at night so I sleep well – hate being hot when I sleep.
I can eat soup pretty much 365 days a year – no problem! And I learned quickly that soup does not make a meal to my husband, that is just an appetizer!
Can’t believe your last day is tomorrow already!!
Sorry about the sleepless nights that is so difficult to deal with. I love soup it’s so filling and a great comfort food.
I found this post though Pinterest. The photo was so beautiful that I just had to come here to read the recipe! Love it! And love your site
.
I would like to invite you to share this post (and your other posts
) on a new photo based recipe sharing site that launched in May. The idea is simple: all recipe photographs are published within minutes of submission. And, of course, the images link back to the author’s site.
It’s called RecipeNewZ (with Z) – http://recipenewz.com
I hope you get a chance to visit and to share some of your delicious posts with our viewers. It would be a pleasure to have you on board