Italian Senza-Wedding Soup

Senza means "without" in Italian... this Italian wedding soup is without the pasta or the egg that is sometimes used. It's also without a wedding.

It's really pretty cold outside and there's nothing quite as warming as soup. but I recently bought some bison meat (which is typically leaner and "beefier" than regular ground beef... the bison are also grass fed and not given any antibiotics) and I wanted to use it for dinner. I had considered making chili, but I have something of a love/hate relationship with beans and lately I've had some issues with GERD so I've been avoiding tomatoes. This soup seemed like a happy compromise, and it is something I've never made, so I thought I'd give it go.

To begin with I sauteed onions, carrots, and celery in some olive oil and added a small amount of homemade beef broth.

While the veggies were sauteing, I mixed the meatballs. I used some chopped onion, smashed garlic, garlic powder, salt and pepper, a couple tablespoons of breadcrumbs, dried parsley, grated parm, an egg, and the ground bison meat.

Then I combined the ingredients all together, and rolled them into small meatballs....

(The eggs in the background are my favorite local eggs.)

In the meantime I added more broth to the veggies... this time I used some organic vegetable broth I had on hand (but I believe chicken broth is usually used).

I think it's traditional to cook the meatballs in the soup, but a few recipes I found cook the the meatballs before adding them to the soup (probably a good way to reduce the amount of fat in the soup when using less lean meat). I wasn't looking to be traditional, but I was looking to make less dishes for myself, so I went for it and just added the meatballs into the broth.

 

I gave the meatballs about 10 minutes to cook through (they started floating to the top when they were done), and then I added some fresh baby spinach to the broth for the greens.

About two minutes later the soup was ready. I served it with some grated parmesan reggianito on top.

This was an incredibly easy meal to make. That's one of the things I like about making most soups--their ease. The meatballs were really tasty, but the broth seemed a bit bland to me--maybe it was because I used low-sodium broth figuring with the cheese and meatballs there wouldn't be a lack of salt, I guess I was wrong. Nevertheless, I really liked the meatballs and, ultimately, the soup was tasty and warming. It was also pretty darn easy.

Some crusty bread would be a nice accompaniment, and pastina or other small pasta could always be added to it, too (I'd probably cook it separately and add it at the end to each separate bowl to keep it from absorbing too much of the broth). I also think, for an even healthier option, ground turkey could be used to make the meatballs.