Italian Wedding Soup

 

My sister- in- law makes the most delicious soups and this one was so good I needed to create it for my family.  Usually this soup has meatballs in it but I like leaving the ground mild Italian sausage in very big chunks when I fry it up instead. 

I don't have specific proportions for soup making, it's kind of just go with the flow in that area of my cooking. But I'll do my best to give you a guide for how this soup was made :) 

  

Italian Wedding Soup

5 Mild Italian Sausages

Diced Onion

Minced Garlic

Celery

Diced Carrots

Diced Potatoes

4 cups Chicken Stock 

2 handfuls Spinach

1/2 cup heavy cream

Salt and Pepper to taste

Fresh Grated Parmesan Cheese

For this recipe I like cutting the casing on the sausages and just using the ground sausage.  When I am frying it up I tend to leave it in big chunks. 

1.  Start by heating up your dutch oven (or whatever soup pot you use) over medium heat with a bit of oil in it.   Fry up the sausage meat until cooked.  Remove from dutch oven and place on some paper towel to drain some of the fat from it.  But you want to keep a little bit of the fat in the dutch oven (trust me this will add so much flavour to your soup). 

2.  In the same dutch oven sauté diced onions, celery and garlic until tender.  Add in diced carrots and potatoes.  Be sure to get them coated in all the extra sausage juice there is in that pot!  

3.  Cover that with 4 cups of chicken broth and let simmer (10-12 minutes) or until your carrots and potato are cooked. 

4.  Add back in your cooked sausage and 2 big handfuls of spinach.  I know it looks like a lot but trust me it cooks down.  

5.  When the spinach has cooked down and is nicely wilted you will want to add in some seasoning.  Salt and pepper .

6.  Now just before serving you want to add in 1/2 cup of heavy whipping cream.  Make sure your soup is only simmering and on low heat when you add in the cream. 

7.  You can either grate in fresh parmesan into the large pot or you can add it to individual bowls. 

8.  Enjoy with a side of these quick and easy 1 hour rolls.