Hello! It is your friendly neighborhood book lady, and this week, I am stepping out of the library and into Kelli’s kitchen for a little column swap. As Kelli mentioned a few pages ago in the Book Report, she and I bonded over our mutual love of books, food, and the Muppets. I am here to add bearded husbands, Wes Anderson movies, puppies, off-colored jokes, and bottomless margaritas. We are two peas in a pod, or maybe two chickpeas in a bowl of this soup? Kelli is a bean connoisseur, so she will approve of a recipe that features garbanzo beans, which I called Gonzo beans for most of my childhood because, well, Muppets, with a few veggies and tender chunks of meat in a flavorful tomatoey broth.
I think this soup started with my Granny Erquiaga and an old Weight Watchers recipe in the 70s or 80s and with a handful of little changes by individual family members, Granny’s Soup is a family staple. Manna from heaven for all of us. Sick? Sad? Feeling cozy? Have a big gathering of hungry people at your house? Need a healthy lunch prep idea? Dump the ingredients into a pot or a slow cooker. Grab a loaf of crusty bread, and this soup will solve all your problems. Okay, maybe not all your problems, but at least your belly will be full.
Granny Erquiaga’s Soup
Ingredients:
A drizzle of olive oil
1 pound of stew meat
1 large onion diced
1 carrot, peeled and diced
1 stalk of celery, chopped (I hate celery, so I chop it up so tiny that I forget it is there)
Several cloves of garlic, finely chopped (who am I to tell you how much garlic – measure with your heart)
2 tablespoons tomato paste
½ cup of red wine (go ahead and a glass for the cook while you’re at it)
1 large potato, peeled and diced
1 tablespoon each of onion powder and garlic powder
2 tablespoons Italian seasoning
Several bay leaves
2 cans of Gonzo beans (or chickpeas if you don’t speak Muppet)
2 cans of diced tomatoes
1 quart of tomato juice (I guess you could use V8 or something, I just use plain)
1 carton of beef broth or stock (more if it gets too thick or you like it brothy)
¾ cup of quick-cooking barley
Salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
In a large soup pot, add olive oil along with onions, carrots, celery and garlic and a sprinkle of salt. Cook over a medium heat until veggies are translucent. Add meat. When the meat is seared, add tomato paste, stirring for a minute or two. Add the wine to deglaze the pan, really scraping the bottom of the pot while the wine is cooking out a little bit. Add potatoes, tomatoes, chickpeas, seasoning, tomato juice and stock. Bring soup up to a boil, cover reduce the heat to low and let it simmer. Go drink the wine you hopefully poured for yourself or read a book or knit or whatever you do while you wait for soup. Your house will start to smell amazing, and it is time to throw in the barley. If my soup starts looking a little too thick, I add some more stock or water. When the barley is tender, season to taste and ladle into big bowls. Sprinkle with parmesan. Warm, crusty French bread for soaking up the broth is a must.
Like many old family favorites, this one is more of a template than a recipe. Don’t have stew meat? Browned hamburger works, or my personal favorite venison. I use barley and potatoes in mine. Granny added cheese tortellini. My gluten-free family uses brown rice; even a handful of macaroni or ditalini works. Sometimes, I even mix whatever combination of these things I have lying around. I often toss in some chopped zucchini, or I add a handful of fresh spinach to my bowl before I ladle the hot soup on top to up the veggie factor. It is truly the foundation of a great soup that is begging to be personalized.
Go forth and make Granny’s soup your own.
Allison Diegel is the Executive Chaos Coordinator at the Diegel Home for Wayward Girls and Their Many Pets here in her hometown of Fallon. She has been reading since before she could talk, and now she likes doing lots of both.
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