It’s a cold, snowy and blustery day here in Chicago and nothing hits the spot better than a warm bowl of soup.  Even better, a big pot of soup can last for several days and seems to taste better and better each time you eat it.  I came across a recipe from Ina Garten (better known as the Barefoot Contessa) for Italian Wedding soup and I thought “How good does this sound?” (if you watch Barefoot Contessa you’ll get the quote).  I have to say, this is a very good recipe that is both yummy and healthy.  Italian Wedding soup is traditionally a chicken broth based soup with small chicken meatballs and a short pasta.  My grocery store was out of ground chicken when I went shopping so I used ground turkey instead and I have to say the meatballs were fabulous.  I’m going to tweak this meatball recipe slightly for an upcoming spaghetti and turkey meatballs recipe that I will be posting once I hammer down the recipe completely.  Anyway, on to the soup recipe….

Ingredients

For the meatballs:

• 1 1/4 pound ground turkey (ground chicken will work too)
• 2/3 cup panko breadcrumbs (panko are Japanese breadcrumbs found in the Asian food aisle)
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic (2 cloves)
• 3 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley leaves
• 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan, plus extra for serving
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the soup:

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 cup minced yellow onion
• 1 cup diced carrots (3 carrots), cut into 1/4 inch pieces
• 3/4 cup diced celery (2 stalks), cut into 1/4 inch pieces
• 10 cups chicken stock (I’ll admit it, I used boxed stock but homemade stock would be preferred if you had it on hand)
• 1/2 cup dry white wine
• 1 cup orzo
• 1/4 cup minced fresh dill
• 12 ounces baby spinach, washed and trimmed

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

For the meatballs, place the ground turkey, bread crumbs, garlic, parsley, Parmesan, milk, egg, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper in a bowl and combine gently.  Don’t overwork the mixture, just enough so all the ingredients are combined – if you overwork the mixture the meat can start to become tough. With a spoon, roll and drop 1 to 1 1/4-inch meatballs onto a sheet pan lined with parchment paper. (The parchment paper is key, the meatballs don’t stick at all.) Bake for 30 minutes, until cooked through and lightly browned. You should end up with about 35-40 meatballs, don’t worry if they are not perfectly round!

While the meatballs are cooking you can start on the soup.  Heat the olive oil over medium-low heat in a large heavy-bottomed soup pot. Add the onion, carrots, and celery and saute until softened, 5 to 6 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the chicken stock and wine and bring to a boil. Add the orzo to the simmering broth and cook for 6 to 8 minutes, until the pasta is tender. Add the fresh dill and then the meatballs to the soup and simmer for 1 minute. Taste for salt and pepper. Stir in the fresh spinach and cook for 1 minute, until the spinach is just wilted (it will seem like a lot of spinach at first but once it wilts it will be just the right amount).   Ladle into soup bowls and sprinkle with extra grated Parmesan.

Hope you enjoy this recipe.  Make sure you don’t miss any upcoming great tasting recipes by subscribing to my RSS feed.