Vegetable Meatball Soup

Loaded with vegetables and homemade meatballs, this light, yet hearty soup comes together in less than 45 minutes. Great weeknight and weekend dinner!

Remember back in November (?), I made a whole bunch of meatballs to freeze? Well, let me tell ya, it was so worth it! Even though I had my mom here helping with my newborn and cooking for us, we had those days we didn’t have much time to cook dinner. And these meatballs were there ready to be cooked. Such a life-saver, ok maybe just a dinner-saver!

Besides making this hearty meatballs in mushroom gravy, we also enjoyed this delicious light and nutritious vegetable meatball soup. I say it’s nutritious, because 1. the soup is made from scratch, 2. it’s loaded with variety of vegetables. And instead of noodles, I made zoodles! Have you jumped on this new vegetable spiralizing bandwagon yet? Is it still relatively new, or am I just too late to the party?

Anyway, making noodles out of zucchini is the way to go here. The only thing to keep in mind is that you want to add your zoodles right before serving, so it doesn’t get overcooked.

For this recipe, I used frozen meatballs, but fresh ones will work too. If using frozen meatballs, no need to thaw them. Yay, that’s another bonus!

Don’t be tempted to skip the browning meatballs. It might seem like an extra step, especially because we’re not cooking them through, but it’s an important step in adding flavors. All that brown bits in the pan left after browning are gold, and you want that in your soup!

Speaking of meatballs, you can, of course, use store-bought frozen meatballs. But I like to make a big batch from scratch and freeze them. You can find my meatball recipe here. My husband loved the soup, but he wished the meatballs in the soup were smaller. And I totally agree mini meatballs would be fabulous! Next time I make a big batch of meatballs, I’ll make sure to make various sizes!

Well, to make the soup it really doesn’t take much time. From start to finish, it took me about 45 minutes, or less, including chopping the veggies. Here’re the step-by-step photo for you, not that you need it.

You can still devour a delicious bowl of soup on chilly spring day, yes? Hope you enjoy!

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Vegetable Meatball Soup

Loaded with vegetables and homemade meatballs, this light, yet hearty soup comes together in less than 45 minutes. Great weeknight and weekend dinner!

Yield: 6 servings

Ingredients:

• 2 medium carrots
• 2 celery sticks
• 1 medium potato
• 2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
• 1lb beef meatballs, fresh or frozen (If frozen, no need to thaw)
• 2-3 garlic cloves, pressed
• 32oz (1L) low sodium beef broth
• 2 cups (480ml) water
• 1 dried bay leaf
• A few sprigs of thyme
• 1 teaspoon salt
• ½ teaspoon black pepper
• 2 small zucchinis
• 1 tablespoon chopped parsley, optional

Helpful Equipment:
• Vegetable Spiralizer (I use this Paderno Spiral Vegetable Slicer)

Directions:

1. Dice the carrots, celery and potato.
2. In a Dutch oven, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil over medium high heat. Add the meatballs and brown on all sides. (It doesn’t have to be completely cooked at this point.) Remove into a plate.
3. In the same Dutch oven, heat the remaining 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Add garlic, carrots and celery and sauté for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally .
4. Add beef broth, water, bay leaf, thyme, salt and pepper. Bring it to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 10-15 minutes, or until the vegetables are tender.
5. Meanwhile, spiralize the zucchini into noodles.
6. Add meatballs and continue to cook until they are cooked through. Then add and zucchini and cook until zucchini is softened, no longer than 5 minute. Remove bay leaf and thyme sprigs. If desired, throw in some chopped parsley. Serve immediately.

For step-by-step photos and additional notes, read the post above.

All images and text ©Shinee D. for Sweet & Savory

All photographs and content on Sweet & Savory by Shinee is copyright protected, unless otherwise noted. Please do not use any of my photos without my authorization. If you would like to share my recipe, you may re-write the recipe in your own words, or simply link back to this post for the full directions. Thank you for your cooperation!