Tomato Soup with Black Beans and Rice

Today's soup was a variation on tomato soup with rice. It tasted great, and is loaded with nutritious ingredients, so I figured I'd share! You can vary this soup yourself, it is so forgiving.

1 onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 fennel bulb, chopped
3-5 large leaves of cabbage, chopped
Heat 1 T. olive oil in a large soup pot, add the above ingredients, and cook, stirring, till limp and fragrant, but not carmelized.

Add
1 c. brown rice
Stir well

Add:
2 chopped tomatoes
Stir well

Add
water or soup stock (about 8-10 cups)
250 g. (approx) tomato paste
1 c. black beans, cooked and drained
salt, pepper, basil, other herbs to taste

Bring soup to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer till the rice is fully cooked (at least 40 min for brown rice)
Serve hot.

Yum! Yes really there are black beans in there, they are just settling to the bottom of the bowl, so hard to see

Enjoy!

















This post was shared with My Legume Love Affair #43 in January 2012. (Find out more about this here)

Tomato Soup with Roasted Red Peppers, Fennel, and Rice

I bought lots of fennel last week. I used up a bunch of bulbs grilling them, and even adding them to my potato soup, but I still had those stalks hanging around. I was determined to use them. After all, fennel is a really healthy food.

I planned to make tomato soup for supper. It was supposed to be a sort of chunky soup, with lots of diced onion, red and green peppers, garlic, and rice thrown in. As I was preparing the onion, I remembered those lonely fennel stalks. I grabbed a few. Chopped them. Added them to the onion that was in my pot... And the result was delicious.

Here's the recipe:


1-2 onions, diced
2 cloves garlic, diced
3 fennel stalks, diced
1 red pepper, diced (I actually used 1/2 a red pepper and 1/2 a green pepper this time)
olive oil
tomato paste (I used about 500 g. It depends on the size of your pot)
water or soup stock
1/2 c. brown rice (or more, if you want)
salt, pepper, basil, oregano, or whatever herbs and seasonings you like best. Maybe one day I'll pick some rosemary from our yard and try that!

Saute the vegetables in olive oil, till the onion is soft and the garlic and pepper are very fragrant and softened as well. Add the rest of the ingredients. Stir well and bring to a boil. Simmer for at least 30 min - make sure your rice is fully cooked before serving. Enjoy!


This post was linked up to the Hearth and Soul Blog Hop on 11/29/2011

Monday Night, July 4, 2011

We have to eat a quick, early supper tonight because of my daughter's ballet recital. We're all very excited to see her dance onstage - the culmination of a year of hard work at twice weekly ballet classes!

So, since my 3 yr old refuses to nap, we're just going to have to eat really simply. And it's a pantry challenge, so I started looking through the freezer:

Here's the plan:

Grilled Cheese Sandwiches (found a loaf of bread in the freezer!)

Rice and Lentils (from the freezer)

Fresh sliced tomatoes (i like to put olive oil and basil on them but the kids prefer them plain. how i wish they would eat foods with flavor...)

Melon (these are a really good buy right now! Kimat Chinam had them on their 8 kilo for 10 shekel list, I wonder what they cost in other stores...)

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

I told you I was hoping for no-fuss menus this week.

I found those large Israeli "bagels" on sale Tuesday, so I bought some. And my kids love bourekas, so we had a simple no fuss menu:

Bagels
Cream Cheese, Butter, Sliced cheese, Cottage Cheese
Potato Bourekas
Cheese Bourekas
Sliced Tomatoes
Fruit Salad

The price of cottage cheese keeps going up, but I found these larger than normal containers so the price was slightly better. But I'm going to have to really keep an eye on those prices, and figure out the best place to stock up, since my 6 & 3 yr olds have decided that they can live on cottage cheese alone...

Shabbat Parashat B'ha'alotcha, June 10-11, 2011

Assuming I can breathe tomorrow, I'll cook for Shabbat... (I'm having something of an asthma flare-up which was exacerbated by smoke in the air from a nearby brush fire today, and I'm trying very hard to avoid the emergency room. Good luck to me...)

Here's the plan:

Some sort of cold soup (help!)

Chicken with date honey (again. trying to use up the date honey)

Barley with mushrooms

Roasted Zucchini

Fresh tomatoes and cucumbers


Baked Potatoes

Fruit for dessert


...

Monday Night, May 17, 2011

So, what's this Healthy Eema going to do? I'd been buying whole wheat pasta at Yesh for about 4.50 NIS per package, and it's a lot more expensive in other places. But now it seems Yesh isn't carrying whole wheat pasta anymore! And I don't think my family will just give up their macaroni and cheese addiction, and I am not switching back to white pasta. So - please, dear readers, if you are in Israel, please tell me which supermarket chain carries whole wheat pasta for under 5 NIS per package (500 g package, that is)!

In the meantime, we have to have a pasta-free menu...

So, Monday night's menu will be:

Vegetable soup (leftover from last night)

Lentils - prepared very simply so reflux girl will eat something

Artichokes - I think I've mentioned how psyched my younger children are about artichokes, and I found them for 4 NIS/kilo today...

Eggplant baked with a creamy-smoked cheese sauce

Tomatoes with basil and olive oil

And something else that the kids will eat instead of eggplant (usually it would be macaroni and cheese) but I don't know what that will be... wish me luck and creativity!

Monday Night, March 28, 2011

Ok -
Quick! What's for dinner? It's a busy day and I'm sneezing my head off... and trying to stick to my pantry challenge...
Quick survey of the kitchen reveals lots of tomatoes and leftover whole wheat bread...

So I made:
Tomato Soup -  I used every shortcut I can... saute onions and garlic in olive oil. Add diced, fresh, ripe tomatoes (I used about 7-8 good sized ones), cover the pot and simmer for about 10 min. over med-low heat. Add water, salt, pepper, and a teaspoon or 2 of honey. Bring to a boil, then simmer for as long as you can manage. Puree with your handy-dandy immersion blender. I also added 1/4 tsp of baking soda to cut the acid for my reflux-girl.

Grilled Cheese sandwiches

Cut veggies