My Mom’s Vegetable Soup

When I was a child I was a very picky eater. I only ate very few vegetables and basically no fruit. I’m still not much of a fruit eater but at least now I have expanded the number of vegetables I eat.

Though I was a picky eater, my Mom’s vegetable soup was the exception to the rule. I would always help myself to seconds whenever Mom made this popular dish.

As I got older, and after my Mom passed away, I became nostalgic about the old recipes my Mom would make when I was a child. I asked my sister, who is as good of a cook, about a few of Mom’s recipes and she helped me out as best as she could.

It’s difficult to get accurate measurements from a good cook. My sister could tell me the ingredients but not how much. She cooks so much, like Mom did, that she cooks instinctively.

Neither my Mom then, nor my sister now, would use measuring cups most of the time. They would pour in the ingredient until they knew it was enough. My Mom would say a pinch of this or a dollop of that. Where she got the term dollop from we could never figure out.

I experimented making the recipe from what my sister told me. What I ended up with tastes just like I remember and this is one of my favorite foods.

Below are the ingredients and directions. The last time I made the recipe it yielded 10 servings at 235 calories a serving. Overall a pretty healthy and delicious meal.

Ingredients

20 ounces beef cubed for stew

1 onion chopped

½ small cabbage chopped

1 can (15 ¼ ounces) corn

1 can (15 ¼ ounces) green beans

1 can (15 ¼ ounces) lima beans

1 can (15 ¼ ounces) peas

1 can (14 ½ ounces) diced tomatoes

2 cups celery chopped

2 cups carrot chopped

3 potatoes cut into cubes

salt

pepper

4 or 5 bay leaves

Instructions

Start by cutting up the beef cubes into smaller pieces in a large pot and cooking the beef until brown and tender.

Add the cabbage, onions, celery and carrots into the pot and cook until they start getting soft. Also add the 2 cups of water or beef broth to keep the vegetables from burning on the bottom of the pot. When you add these vegetables also add the bay leaves and salt and pepper to your liking.

After these vegetables have started getting soft then add the cans of corn, green beans, lima beans, peas and diced tomatoes to the pot.

At this point bring everything to a boil while stirring. After that turn the heat down to a simmer and let the flavor of the vegetables soak into the broth for 20 to 30 minutes. Occasionally stir.

Then serve.

This is one of those meals that gets even better with time. The next day’s leftovers seem even better than the fresh meal because the flavor has had time to permeate into everything overnight.

Give this recipe and try and let me know what you think.

As always, have a wonderful and blessed day.