I went to the Northside UC Farmers Markets last Saturday, because let’s face it Canberra it is way too cold at the moment to get out of bed and go to the EPIC Farmers Markets at 6am. The wonderful thing about the UC Markets is that they run at a much more reasonable time of 2pm-4:30pm… This gives you an appropriate amount of sleep in time on a Saturday (seeing as we don’t have sport aged children) and also enough time for the day to ‘warm up’… oh who am I kidding it’s #canbrrr!
I didn’t head to the markets with a shopping list – I just thought that I would channel my inner Nigel Slater and pick up ingredients that looked good to create some awesome meals. I couldn’t go past the amazingly fresh fruit and veggies – the spinach and the cabbage really jumped out at me.
With the weather being so cold, two recipes jumped into my mind as we perused the stalls… minestrone soup and bangers and mash. Funnily enough, the stall that was selling the awesome organic beef sausages also was selling potatoes – match made in heaven.
The Italian bread was also just so good that Mr Moo and I broke into the loaf on our car ride home – so good! Oh and we loved the fact that it was pre-sliced!
When I googled minestrone soup when I got home, I was surprised to see that it included bacon…so for those of you who are interested this is a vegetarian version of minestrone soup as I didn’t have any bacon on hand. You can add or leave it out…whatever you choose. So I guess this recipe is fitting for ‘Meatless Monday’!
MINESTRONE SOUP
1/2 cabbage
1 large leek
1 brown onion
1 carrot
1 zucchini
1 potato
1 cup of green beans (cut into 2cm pieces)
1 jar of passata (or a tin of crushed tomatoes)
1 litre of veggie stock
1 cup of risoni (or any pasta you have on hand)
1 bay leaf
1 tablespoon of mixed Italian herbs
olive oil
sea salt and cracked black pepper
Drizzle some oil into a deep saucepan and bring to a medium heat. Add the diced onion and leek first, followed by the diced carrot, potato, zucchini and green beans. Allow the veggies to become a little soft before adding the passata, veggie stock, bay leaf, mixed Italian herbs and diced cabbage. Bring to the boil and then allow to simmer for 30 minutes.
Check the amount of liquid in the saucepan, you may need to add a little water (and allow to to come back to the simmer) before adding the risoni and cooking for 15 minutes.
Season with salt and pepper before serving with some crusty Italian bread.
