Soup is a wonderful food for students to learn, because it contains a whole meal in a single bowl. It also is a great way to take the chill off cold, rainy, windy days such as the one we had for our Week 5 class. The weather forced cancellation of some after-school activities, but not ours because we were warm and safe inside the school kitchen. Still, only two students braved the storm to make Tortellini Minestrone Soup.
Arielis Lopez and Elvin Jimenez demonstrated so much skill and enthusiasm, however, that we hardly noticed the students who were missing.
Soups are healthy, flavorful, inexpensive and easy to prepare. They also come in endless varieties. They can be creamy or clear, use vegetables or meat, and be spicy or sweet. They also can be made with fresh ingredients or leftovers, and are a way for families to make the most of the food they have in the refrigerator and never waste a thing.
Minestrone (MIN-es-TRONE-ee) is a traditional soup from the European nation of Italy. It uses a variety of vegetables and spices, and also can contain meat. Ours didn’t, but cannellini beans and delicious parmesan cheese provided protein and plenty of flavor.
Other featured vegetables included onion, garlic, celery, peas, green beans and green zucchini squash, plus canned tomatoes we added for color and flavor.
Both Arielis (“Ari” for short) and Elvin love chopping, and they plunged right in to get all the ingredients ready for the soup pot. They made short work of cutting the green beans into short lengths and had fun half-peeling the zucchini so it looked like it had stripes.
“It looks like a zebra,” Ari declared before moving on to the celery. Our stalk had been sitting too long in the refrigerator and was a bit floppy when she picked it up. “It wiggles like a worm!” Ari noted, and after cutting the celery cross-wise she added that the smaller pieces “looked like little worms!”
Both Elvin and Ari had extra fun learning that when a recipe says garlic should be “smashed,” it means SMASHED. Both knew that they should press on the garlic cloves with the flat side of a knife, but they were timid pressing down on them.
“That’s no fun,” Mr. Peter declared, pounding the knife with his fist. “Do that!” Our chefs were happy to follow his example, making their garlic cloves flatter than flat.
When it came time for cooking, the smashed garlic went into the pot first, but only for a short time to flavor the olive oil. Then Ari and Elvin took turns adding the peas, onion, celery, green beans and zucchini, and pouring chicken stock over them all.
They were impatient waiting for the concoction to come to a boil so they could add the spinach and cheese tortellini, and they really wanted to know how the tortellini would taste.
Ari, who said she “loves onions,” couldn’t wait until the soup was done to sample them, and fished several out with a plastic spoon to see how they were doing.
When we brought the pot of soup to the table, both students and teachers wanted to taste how the minestrone had turned out.
Ari, who had not expected to like it, admitted “It’s not bad.” Elvin, however, had the opposite view, offering a very brief “not good” when asked his opinion.
Ari said she “liked the onions best” but would “put more seasoning in it” if she were to make it for her family.
Still, she wanted to take the leftovers home, since “I don’t like to waste food.”
“I want to take the whole pot,” she said, and we found containers to make it happen.
