Italian Wedding Soup
Ingredients
Meatballs
- 1 cup plain breadcrumbs
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup peccorino cheese
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/2 tbsp dried mint
- 1/2 tbsp parsley
- 1 lb ground turkey can use any meat of preference
- salt and pepper to taste
Soup
- 2 stalks Celery roughly sliced
- 2 carrots roughly sliced
- 1 diced onion
- 3 cloves or garlic smashed
- 2 tbsp chicken bouillon add more to taste
- water add as much as you need to fill pot 3/4 of the way
- 1/2 bunch chopped escarole
- 1 bunch spinach
- small pasta like ditalini, acini di pepe, pastina, or mini farfalle
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, combine breadcrumbs, egg, cheese, milk, mint, parsley, salt and pepper. Mix to combine.
- Add meat and mix in. Feel the mixture, it should be moist and not overly dry. Set aside while you prep the other ingredients.
- Roughly slice the celery and carrots. Smash Garlic and dice onions.
- In a large stockpot, add olive oil. When it gets hot, add celery, carrots and onions. Saute till translucent.
- To the pot, add chicken bouillon and mix with veggies. Once fully mixed in, add water. Bring water to a boil.
- While waiting for the water to boil, begin rolling your meatballs. The smaller the better. Set aside.
- Clean and chop your greens – escarole and spinach. The best greens for this soup is squash leaves (or tenerumi) if you can find.
- Once water comes to a boil, taste the liquid for seasoning, if needed more salty add more chicken bouillon. Add the meat balls carefully in. Let boil for another 10-15 minutes till meatballs are fully cooked.
- In a separate pot, add water and chicken bouillon and bring to a boil. Add small pasta and fully cook. I cook it separately so that the soup keeps for a few days.
- Add greens in and then taste the broth again. Add salt and pepper as necessary. Once the greens have fully wilted within the soup, its ready to serve.
- Spoon soup into bowl, followed by the pasta, and then top with cheese. Enjoy!
Video
A Wedding Soup?
For a very long time, I believed this Italian Wedding Soup was called Minestra Marittata because it was served at weddings – which I actually never saw being served at all of the Italian weddings I went to. Come to learn, its actually called a wedding soup because the ingredients are being “married” together. And they really do meld together quite deliciously. But, there are some changes I will make for the next attempt of this recipe. And when I do, I will be sure to update it here (hopefully).
Potential Changes
Typically, my meatballs are more bread then meat. For this recipe, I should definitely change that. The bread made the balls a little too big and for a great Italian wedding soup, you need tiny balls (Hold for immature laughter). In addition, rolling these balls were tedious! Next time I am stuffing it in a ziplock and cutting it as it comes out of the corner I will cut. I also am not a fan of escarole – skipping that next time, I will put more spinach or if it is in season some yummy tenerumi (squash leaves).
Do you have a different variation of Italian Wedding soup? If so, I would be more than happy to read and attempt! For now, continue being SOUPer! (See what I did there hehe.)
Links:
