After watching me make soup a couple of times, Nelson surprised me the other night by making a soup of his own, using what we have, just like I would, he whipped up the most delicious little soup one can imagine! And all from the things that needed to be used up: 2 sad looking zucchini squash, celery, 4 mushrooms leftover from making pizza on Friday, the rest of the pizza sauce, a can of pinto beans, some speck and a lovely misshapen red peppers that were on ‘quick sale’ at the store. Oh, but I wouldn’t do it justice by forgetting the not-all-that-hot looking little hot pepper we got from Dawn’s garden that spiced up the whole pot. It was super awesome! I might be odd, but I had to have some for breakfast today, yes, it was that yummy 🙂
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons coconut or olive oil
- 1 onion chopped
- 4 big button mushrooms, cut into chunks
- 3-4 stalk of celery, chopped
- 1 can Pinto beans, rinsed (or frozen equivalent)
- 1 small green zucchini
- 1 small yellow squash
- 1 8 oz can of tomato sauce (or about 1 cup leftover pizza sauce)
- 1 red bell pepper or ‘sweet ancient’ (long and funky looking)
- 1 hot red pepper (cherry or the one we had which looked innocent like a mini bell pepper)
- 1/4 cup diced Speck (pronounced “Shpek”, German slab bacon, cut into cubes)*
- water (which should not be underestimated when making soup)
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 no salt added vegan broth cube from Rapunzel
*For vegetarian option, leave the Speck out, but make sure you blacken the red bell pepper, to give the soup some smoky depth.
The odd little bag, you ask? Yes, that’s my frozen beans, I soak and cook beans for several meals and freeze them in snack size bags = just about a can of beans
Directions
- Heat oil in a soup or stock pot, add the diced onions, celery and sweet red pepper, cook until softened and just starting to brown slightly.
- Add the mushrooms and speck and cook just another minute before adding about 4 cups of water, the vegetable bouillon cube and the pizza or tomato sauce. If the beans are frozen, add them at this point.
- Bring to a boil and cook until vegetables are tender and the soup gets cloudy looking and thickens a little, then add the finely diced hot pepper
- In the meantime, cut the squash lengthwise into spears and chop into pieces, add to the soup and cook for another 5-10 minutes.
Good with Rosemary Soca or corn chips!
© 2012 SimpleHealthyHomemade
