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February 28, 2011

My Kitchen, My World: Italy, Italian Wedding Soup

This challenge coincided nicely with Tim giving me the The Italian Slow Cooker cookbook*, and a Ravioli Press* for my birthday. So it's been something of an Italy month around here. Here are some pictures of our various meals (too lazy to put up all the recipes, but if there's a special request, let me know!), and my recipe for Italian wedding soup at the end of the post.

Started with making some homemade ravioli. Mixed some ricotta in with several odds and ends of cheese I was trying to use up before a trip, and an egg. Very fun, and I feel like I've gotten the hang of the pasta roller enough that it was very doable.

Then I combined a couple of recipes from the Italian Slow Cooker cookbook to make turkey cacciatore. Started with her recipe for chicken ragu, and ended up throwing some sliced onions, sauteed bell peppers, wine and an extra can of tomatoes into the mix to make it more cacciatore-ish.

And another night, we had the pasta faziole from the same book (with some kale thrown in for good measure).

This past week, I made spaghetti with meatballs one night, saved a few of the meatballs, and made Italian wedding soup a few days later.

Had some fun cultural pairings with the meals, too. Watched Big Night on one of the nights. Another night, Tim was doing his opera homework and watching Donizetti while I cooked.

I've made Italian wedding soup probably a dozen times or so, different every time. Basically, broth, veggies, greens, pasta, meatballs and usually, chicken meat as well. Here's the process I did last night.

Italian Wedding Soup (5-6 main course servings)

1 carrot, diced
1 onion, diced
1 celery stick, diced
5-7 cloves garlic, minced
1 chicken breasts OR 3 turkey wings (with skin and bones if you're making stock) OR 1 chicken breast (boneless, skinless) if you have stock and you have meatballs
1/2- 1 lb. Meatballs (mini meatballs if you're making them by hand, regular meatballs are fine)
2 quarts broth
1 bunch kale (or spinach or mild cabbage or whatever greens your family prefers
Handful of fresh herbs,chopped (I used basil and parsley) or dried herbs
8 oz. small pasta (last night, I used orrechiette)
Salt and pepper to taste
Grated parmesan for serving

1) If you're making stock, start earlier in the day. Toss the turkey or chicken into a crockpot (or do this on the stove), cover with broth, cook for 5-6 hours until tender. Remove, shred chicken, return bones and skin to the crockpot. At this point, you can add some veggies or some vegetable scraps into it. Cook for a couple more hours, strain.
2) Make meatballs, if you're doing homemade. You can do it with some of the shredded meat from the chicken/turkey, or you can make some with ground meat. Here's one recipe I've used. I usually pre-cook the meatballs to make them firm.
3) Sautee the celery, carrots, onion, garlic in a little olive oil until translucent (medium heat in a large pot)
4) Optional: You could just dump the veggies into the crockpot at this point into the strained stock.
5) But I continued on the stove-top. Add the stock, and bring to a simmer (maybe 5-10 minutes). Then add the greens, meatballs, shredded chicken/turkey and herbs. It's better to cook the pasta separately, especially if you're planning leftovers. Usually I'm too lazy though, so just add the pasta at this time and cook until al dente. Add salt (not too much since parmesan is coming!) and pepper to taste
7) Serve with parmesan and good bread

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My Kitchen, My World , cooking stuff , immigrant cooking , slow cooker | By Tim and Jo | 9:05 AM

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Posted by: Bob at March 16, 2011 8:57 AM

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