Noodle Expansion

Cold days=Hot Soup and anyone who is here in Colorado this year knows it’s been cold an long.

I made some minestrone soup that was amazing. Parmesan rind is the secret flavor in this ever popular soup. I made mine with vegan beef bouillon cubes and a can of diced tomatoes for the base. Cannellini beans, potatoes, rainbow chard, traditional mirepoix which is 2 parts onion, 1 part carrot and 1 part celery, garlic, and shallots. I also added some fresh rosemary and basil. It was phenomenal the first day and second day then the third day I made a huge disaster out of the leftover soup.

The first two days I kept the noodles separate. I cooked them very al dente then added soup to the cooked noodles. Than the third day I took the remaining half pot of soup over to a friend’s house. I was starving and they didn’t have any clean pots so I added an extra 2 cups of water to the soup and brought it to a boil. Against my better judgment I added the noodles to the soup. Now I know better than that but being starving I let my stomach take over. My bowl of soup was great, but no one else was hungry 7 minutes later so the noodles sat in the pot. BIG MISTAKE! I ended up with a pot of completely expanded star noodles. After simmering for another hour or two the noodles absorbed all the liquid that was in the pot… I ended up with mushy slimy noodle based soup. Lesson learned; cook the noodles separate and add the soup, if not you will end up with a pot of slimy noodles.