Large Bowl #1

 

I know I'm bad with titles; it's fine, you don't care, and if you do, you aren't complaining. (I probably wouldn't change if you complained, anyway, but it's nice that it seems nobody minds my not-that-descriptive blog titles.) So here we have the first of the "large bowl" series.

And you see there a zucchini cornmeal muffin (recipe from Fran Costigan) and something I dubbed "scrap soup" made from what was in my fridge. This consists of some broth made from Better Than Bouillon vegetable base, a half a jar of tomato basil pasta sauce, onions, celery, carrots, parsnips, mushrooms, broccoli stems, the chopped core of a cauliflower, some cauliflower leaves, and chickpeas, along with a little bit of orzo I had and a little bit of Barilla Protein+ rotini.

It was delicious. Raid-the-fridge soup usually is! And what's more, I didn't have to buy anything or even make very much effort. I had made the muffins a while ago and they were in my freezer, so all I had to do was thaw one. As for the soup, I followed my typical method of sauteing the sturdier vegetables (i.e., the onions, celery, carrots, parsnips, broccoli stems, cauliflower core, and cauliflower leaves) until softened, then adding in the mushrooms, chickpeas, and broth. I brought it to a simmer and, when I knew the vegetables were cooked enough, I poured in the rotini and orzo. Once everything was cooked through, it was done.

This is actually leftovers of the soup, because I made it a few days before when it was too dark to photograph. The pasta did soak up nearly all the soup in between, but I added some more veggie broth and brought it to a simmer to reheat and it worked out beautifully.

I'm using what I've got, still, and learning I actually have a lot. Here's to surviving.