Lasagna Soup

Well. Pretty much nothing went according to plan today--including dinner. But that's okay, because this recipe is easy to make, and perfect for a super-cold, blustery day like today.

This soup is from the Deen brothers (Paula Deen's sons). Their food blog has a whole section of their mother's recipes that they have re-written to be a just-as-yummy lighter version.  This one is called "Lighter Tastes Like Lasagna Soup."

One problem that I ran into was that my grocery stores only carry Italian turkey sausage once in a great while, and this week turned out to not be one of those times. :( You can use regular ground Italian pork sausage, but I really wanted to keep this lean. After pouting for a few minutes in the store, I looked up a recipe for homemade Italian turkey sausage on my smartphone (so smart!) and decided to make my own sausage (well, Italian-seasoned ground turkey, anyway--not really sausage).

Ideally, you would want to make the turkey sausage ahead of time and let it sit overnight so that the meat can absorb the flavors of the seasoning a little more fully, but this ended up working out just fine for tonight. Ben recently received a meat-grinding attachment for our KitchenAid mixer for his birthday, though, so I may buy some turkey breast and try to make my own real Italian turkey sausage to freeze and keep on hand.

One final note on the ingredients-- pay attention to the nutrition labels for different brands of the same item, as they can definitely vary! I looked at Hunt's tomato sauce, and it had over 400mg of sodium in it...Contadina's tomato sauce only had about 280mg of sodium!

Also, I must apologize for a lack of pictures tonight--I was so rushed and overwhelmed by the time I got home (late), I forgot to stop and take pictures until I was about halfway done with the meal.

Is it Friday yet?


Easy Italian Turkey Sausage (adapted from Cooking with Michele recipe)
1 pound ground turkey
1/2 tbspn fennel seeds
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp ground thyme
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground black pepper

Mix spices and meat well with a fork. Set aside to rest for a few minutes before cooking.


Lasagna Soup

Ingredients
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 pound Italian turkey sausage, casings removed
1 onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 (32-ounce) container chicken broth (I used Kitchen Basics unsalted chicken stock)
1 (15-ounce) can tomato sauce (I used Contadina's brand)
1 (14 1/2-ounce) can petite diced tomatoes (I used Hunt's No Salt Added)
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 ounces broken whole-wheat lasagna noodles (I used Kroger brand whole wheat rotini because I didn't have lasagna noodles)
1/2 cup chopped fresh basil
1/2 cup reduced-fat shredded mozzarella cheese
Grated parmesan cheese and/or part-skim ricotta cheese (for serving)

Heat the oil over medium-high heat in a large nonstick pot or Dutch oven. Add the sausage, onion, bell pepper, and garlic. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until the sausage is crumbled and browned, 8 – 10 minutes.

Add the broth, tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, and salt. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the flavors are blended, about 20 minutes. Add the noodles; bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until the soup thickens slightly and the noodles are tender, 10 – 12 minutes.

Remove from the heat; stir in mozzarella and basil.

Serve in a bowl with sprinkled parmesan or a dollop of ricotta cheese.

The noodles were actually enough to be my carb serving for the evening, but how can you eat soup on a cold day without at least a small slice of crusty bread? ;) 

Also, FYI, I did saute some zucchini to eat while the soup was simmering--partly because I was starving, but also to make sure I still got my full vegetable serving in for the day.

Enjoy!