Go-To Meals

We are terrible at menu planning. This is a fact. I know for some people it's a method of survival, for [Husband] and I, it's something we seem to avoid at all costs. [Husband] has a very European attitude about shopping. He would go to the grocery store every day if I let him (how French...), though he also likes to go to Costco and stock up like the apocalypse is coming (there something very eastern bloc about this to me). I think I avoid planning because everything else in my life requires SO MUCH attention and planning I like to feel I can fly by the seat of my pants somewhere and still be spontaneous. However, when you are cold, sad and hungry on a Tuesday night and all that's in the fridge are some pickles and a stale baguette... Point being, I am trying to combat this and develop new more desirable habits by A) meal planning and making weekly grocery trips and B) building up a better arsenal of default easy dishes, so we don't eat spaghetti (in its many and sundry glorious forms) every single night. Because that can indeed happen at our house. My preference is for dishes that at least appear healthy and nutritionally sound, can possibly be prepared vegetarian (we eat WAY too much red meat) and have room for more vegetables. It's a struggle sometime too to find things that meet my healthy requirements and don't leave [Husband] foraging for cheese and crackers after dinner. Bulking up the vegetables helps make most dishes more filling. Here's one of my favorites, it's from the Whole foods website. It's actually a vegan recipe, but we usually make it with either turkey sausage meatballs or regular sweet/mild Italian sausage. And I use the term "meatball" very loosely. It's meat rolled into a ball. We don't do any fancy s*** here. Italian Wedding Soup with Vegan Meatballs

Ingredients

1 (15-ounce) can Italian-style diced tomatoes with garlic, oregano and basil 6 cups organic vegetable broth (2 boxes of stock/broth) 3/4 c. elbow pasta 1 (16-ounce) package vegan meatballs 2 c. of spinach, roughly chopped (just buy a bag) 2 teaspoons dried Italian seasoning Sea salt and ground black pepper 2-3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese (if desired, Kraft shaker cheese=perfect)

Method

Yes, this recipe can be vegan or vegetarian. I have never made it vegan or vegetarian, but it's flexible! Start off making your meatballs, I either get sausage (turkey or pork) already in the casing or just plain ground meat. If it's in the casing, squeeze the meat out of the casing into a bowl, roll into balls, and poof--you have meatballs. They need to be cooked before they go into the soup, so here's what I do: 6 cups of stock is equal to 1.5 of those boxes of stock you buy at the store. Pour the half box you aren't going to use in the soup into a frying pan and turn it to medium high heat. Shape your meat balls and toss them in the frying pan. "Poaching" them in the vegetable stock this way makes them beyond delectable. Especially if you're using turkey because let's face it, ground turkey has no flavor. The meatballs can be made ahead, and I recommend this because after the 20 minutes it takes to do the meatballs, it takes 15 minutes to do the rest. Bring the tomatoes and the remaining 6 cups of broth to a boil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Simmer 10 minutes. Add pasta, meatballs, and Italian seasoning and cook until the pasta is tender and meatballs are cooked through, about 8 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Add some Parmesan (the Kraft shaker cheese is perfect) to thicken. Add spinach and allow it to wilt just a bit. Ladle into bowls and serve. Sprinkle with Parmesan if desired. A few more notes:

• Sometimes chicken stock is easier to find. You can use it, but the veggie stock is so rich and delicious. I know stock can be pricey, but you can often find it on sale for 2 for $5 or something and it's really great to have around to add flavor/cook with without using oil. If you do occasionally go to Whole Foods, I do recommend checking there as they regularly have better prices on stock than Harris Teeter. Costco is another good place to check (though I know ours only ever has chicken stock).
• 3/4 c of pasta doesn't seem like much, but believe me, it's plenty. It plumps up in the soup a lot.
• Sweet or mild sausage works best. The spicy sausage flavor just doesn't mesh as well with the other flavors I find.
• I usually add in a can of white (cannellini or great northern) beans (drained and rinsed) when I add the meatballs. It just adds some extra volume to the soup.
• You can skip the cheese, but adding a little in thickens the soup nicely.
• To make this even faster, you could buy the pre-made turkey meatballs from the meat section of the grocery store.
• It's says 2 cups of rough chop spinach. Whatever. Buy a bag of baby spinach, throw it in by the handful at the end until it looks pretty good and use the rest for a salad. This would be a great recipe to use if you had some spinach that's got to be used quickly and you aren't too enthused about eating it raw, now that I think about it.
• You could also use kale or swiss chard in this to up the nutritional ante, though you'd either want to blanch the greens before or just add them to the soup earlier and cook them longer than you would spinach.
• Adding some garlic in any form to this is never bad. As my Dad says, you can never have too much garlic or too much love.
• This reheats really well and keeps very nicely for several days. I've never tried to freeze it. We're pretty hearty eaters so we can typically get a substantial dinner and 2-3 lunch portions out of this.

I would say our other go to is probably vegetarian chili. We are always stocked up on beans and canned tomatoes in our pantry so throwing some 3 bean red chili together is pretty easy. What are the "go-to" meals in your house?