Homemade hearty beef soup is a great meal for the colder months of the year and offers a healthy but filling alternative to other meal options. Hundreds of beef soup recipes are at your disposal--many of which call for the same ingredients--but yours can stand out from the others based on the way you prepare it. If you cook the soup for two hours instead of five, your family or guests will notice. It is important to allow the ingredients enough time to come together and add flavors to the soup.
Ingredients
This recipe calls for cubed beef, beef broth, chopped onions, sliced carrots, sliced celery, cubed peeled potatoes, canned tomatoes, sugar, salt, black pepper, crushed rosemary, ground thyme, ground marjoram, frozen peas, and other ingredients you may wish to add. The amounts of each ingredient are up to you. Soup allows for creativity in that you can add various amounts of a wide variety of ingredients to suit your taste. You should, however, have an idea of what ingredients occupy more space in the soup before throwing your soup together.
Preparation
Preparation of this soup will be much easier if you have a food processor because there are so many ingredients. If you do not have a food processor, give yourself enough time to chop and dice the ingredients. In a crock pot--after ingredients are prepared as they should be--add meat, onions, celery, carrots, potatoes, tomatoes and beef broth, adding seasonings to taste. If, after all ingredients are added, the soup is too thick, add more beef broth; if it is too thin, add more beef and vegetables. Soup is a flexible meal to make, enabling you to tweak it as you go.
Cooking
In making vegetable beef soup, give yourself enough time. The best soup has time for its ingredients to simmer and mix. If you have to work, mix the ingredients in the morning and let the soup cook in the crock pot all day while at work. This is a popular way to prepare soup or stew. Turn the crock pot on medium-low in the morning and, by the time you get home five to eight hours later, it should be ready. Stir well at the end of the cooking process and serve.
Tags: beef broth, enough time, yourself enough time, beef soup, food processor, give yourself, give yourself enough
