Meredith’s Frugal Vegetable Soup

June 4th, 2009

I read a Heloise column a few months ago with a reader tip that said to dice and freeze any leftover fresh vegetables you had, to use later in soups or stews. This seemed like such a smart idea to me for a number of reasons. First, I love to buy fresh vegetables when they are in season and cheap. Second, I usually ended up buying too much and throwing away what we didn’t use before it went bad. Third, things are too tight right now to just throw food away. Fourth, I love stew, so having my prep work done ahead of time seemed like a no-brainer.

So I took a large tub, and just added to it with any leftover veggies we had from whatever dish we were cooking for dinner that night, and kept it in my freezer. Since it is summer, I ended up with a lot of zucchini, celery and carrots. I had leftover V8 and chicken broth from my latest batch of Almost La Madeleine Tomato Basil Soup. So tonight I decided it was time to try making a vegetable soup. It was amazing. Really, some of the best vegetable soup I’ve had and far superior to any canned version we’ve been eating.

3 cups V8
1 ¼ cup chicken broth
1 can diced tomatoes
1 can white kidney beans, rinsed
1 can black eyed peas, partially rinsed
1 parsnip, peeled and diced
2 red potatoes, peeled and diced
1 yellow squash, diced
1 zucchini, diced
1 cup shredded carrots
1 cup corn
1 cup celery, thinly sliced
salt & pepper to taste
¼ teaspoon paprika

Combine all ingredients in a large pot. Simmer for 2 hours, stirring periodically. Enjoy.

Notes: In my frozen tub, I had shredded carrots, zucchini, celery, and corn. I added fresh the parsnip, potatoes and yellow squash (which was on sale at Kroger this week). The other ingredients are all pantry staples for me. Jonathan deemed it “delicious!” I ended up with probably 8-10 servings from the entire pot. I put part of it away to freeze, and still have enough for us to have dinner again and for me for lunch tomorrow.

It will be wonderful with some warm crusty bread or cheese on top. The best thing, is you can completely customize it for your tastes. I’m really pleased with the result, and probably won’t ever buy canned vegetable soup again.