Kind of a bastardized Italian wedding soup, very easy (pressure cooker friendly!) and uses just a few pantry staples to come together. Perfect comfort food.
Italian wedding soup, or minestra maritata, is green veggies and meat (meatballs or sausage) ‘married’ together in (traditionally chicken) broth. Also containing pasta and a lot of herbs and probably some Parmigiano. I don’t add any cheese or greens (herbs) so I’m not going to use that name (so no one kills me). And there’s the addition of tomatoes because I love tomatoes in my soups.
Put whatever you want in this soup, my only recommendation is to get good sausages and get good broth. I usually cook this with chicken broth that I made myself (god bless the Instant Pot), but I’m sure it’ll be great with store-bought if you need something super fast.
Sausage & Orzo Soup
Ingredients
- 200 g orzo (around 1 cup) or other tiny pasta
- 4 mild Italian sausages cut into pieces (I snip them with scissors because it's easier!)
- 2 medium shallots chopped
- 3~5 cloves garlic crushed and peeled
- 1 can whole tomatoes
- 1~1.5 mL broth (preferably chicken) (4~6 cups)
- 1 tbsp dried herbs (i.e. oregano, thyme, rosemary)
- Salt to taste
- Pepper to taste
- 1~2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 handful basil leaves
Instructions
- In a large wide pot*, add olive oil on medium high heat.
- Add the cut sausages & cook for 5 minutes until it browned but not fully cooked through. Add shallots and garlic.
- Add the whole tomatoes & use the juice to deglaze the brown bits on the bottom of the pan.
- Add salt, pepper, dried herbs, and chicken broth. Let simmer for 10~15 minutes, and then add the orzo. Continue to cook until orzo is tender.
- Adjust seasoning to taste & stir in basil leaves.
