Soup is Good Food: Pasta e Fagioli

I love soup. I’m just a big whore for soup, especially in the fall and winter.  There are few things as comforting as curling up by a fire with a good movie or a book and yummy bowl of hearty soup.

The crap part of it, is that a lot of soups are way high in fat.  Especially canned soups; not to mention full of sodium.  Plus, many people think that cans of soup are one serving, when in fact, they are usually two to two and a half. Yikes!

My favorite soup recipe originally came from Cooking Light, but I modified the hell out of it and made it my bitch. I now have a torrid affair with this soup at least a few times a season.

Pasta e Fagioli

• 2 tablespoon olive oil
• 4 ounces extra-lean hot turkey Italian sausage
• 1 1/2 tablespoons bottled minced garlic
• 1/2 cup diced purple onion
• 1/2 cup diced celery
• 1/2 cup diced carrot
• 1 can Bold Italian Ro-Tel Diced Tomatoes
• 1 cup water
• 3/4 cup white wine (or red, if that’s all you’ve got)
• 1 (16-ounce) can fat-free, sodium-free chicken broth
• 1 (8-ounce) can no-salt-added tomato sauce
• 1 cup uncooked small seashell pasta (about 4 ounces)
• 3/4 cup grated reduced fat romano or parmesan cheese, divided
• 1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black or white pepper
• 1 can white kidney beans (cannellini beans) (15 oz.)
• 1 cup zucchini and/or yellow squash (chunked)
• 1 can dark red kidney beans (15 oz.)
• 1/2 chopped or torn fresh cilantro

Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the holy trinity (carrots, onion and celery) and garlic; sauté 2 minutes or until lightly browned.  Add sausage, removed from casing, brown until crumbled.

Add water, broth, Ro-Tel, wine and tomato sauce; bring to a boil. Stir in pasta, half of the cheese, oregano, salt, pepper, squash, cilantro and beans; bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer for 8 minutes or until pasta is done. Do NOT overcook pasta. It’ll get huge and take over your whole soup. Let stand 5 minutes; sprinkle with remaining cheese. Garnish each serving red pepper, if desired.

Yield: 6-8 servings, depending on how big of a bowl you’ve got. (which, coincidentally, makes it 6-8 POINTS a serving, depending again on the bowl size. Big bowl, I’d go 7-8 Points.)

This may seem high in points for a soup, but keep in mind, it’s a pretty hearty soup. I’m stuffed when I eat this and the flavor is incredible. You could add more veggies if you want or eliminate the meat (though, a lot of the flavor comes from that). You can monkey with it a lot to customize, but this is the best version I’ve made.  It’s also really easy to make.

Serve with a small salad with fat-free italian for a really filling meal.  Oh, and p.s. it’s awesome the next day. It just gets better with time and you can eat on this for a week (if you’re single).