Week 2: Lentil Soup With Pasta

Vegetable Ingredients: Lentils, tomatoes, carrots


This week I made lentil soup. Again, this is something I made in the past (with some success), but I couldn't find my original recipe anymore. So I used this one, by Giada De Laurentiis (a person I had never heard about before).

• Ingredients
• 2 tablespoons olive oil, plus extra for drizzling (I did without the drizzling)
• 1 medium onion, chopped (this is when I discovered that one can buy prechopped onions. Hooray!)
• 2 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 2 celery stalks, chopped (ditched these, I hate celery)
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped (used frozen garlic cubes from Trader Joe's)
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 (14 1/2-ounce) can diced tomatoes
• 1 pound lentils (approximately 1 1/4 cups)
• 11 cups low-salt chicken broth (11 cups? That's a lot!)
• 4 to 6 fresh thyme sprigs
• 2/3 cup dried elbow pasta (I used a little more)
• 1 cup shredded Parmesan

Directions

Heat the oil in a heavy large pot over medium heat. Add the onion and carrots. Add the garlic, salt, and pepper and saute until all the vegetables are tender, about 5 to 8 minutes. Add the tomatoes with their juices. Simmer until the juices evaporate a little and the tomatoes break down, stirring occasionally, about 8 minutes. Add the lentils and mix to coat. Add the broth and stir. Add the thyme sprigs. Bring to a boil over high heat. Cover and simmer over low heat until the lentils are almost tender, about 30 minutes. Stir in the pasta. Simmer until the pasta is tender but still firm to the bite, about 8 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, to taste. Ladle the soup into bowls. Sprinkle with the Parmesan and serve.

Verdict: 7/10

The soup didn't taste as rich and stewlike as the one that I meant to make, but it was really quite good, especially the next day. 6 servings seems about right (4 servings for hungry people).