Sunday night we had some left over chicken broth, a few vegetables leftover from dinner the night before, some beans in the cabinet, along with some pasta and decided to make some Pasta e Fagioli soup.  This is one of my favorite soups because it is so versatile, you can add whatever vegetables you happen to have.  If you don’t have beans it becomes minestrone.  It’s fairly simple and easy to make.

The recipe calls for 2 cups of aromatic vegetables (carrots, onions, and celery), I used a little of all, but you could use whatever you have handy.  It also calls for 2 cups of hard vegetables, we used potatoes and a winter squash we had leftover from our winter CSA.  I didn’t add any this time, but in the past i’ve added a cup or two of leafy vegetables like spinach or kale.  I also threw in a bit of pesto we had made and frozen last summer.

I’ve adapted this recipe from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian by Mark Bittman:

Put oil in a large saucepan over medium heat.  When hot add the onions, carrots and/or celery.  Cook stirring until soft, about 5 minutes.

Add the hard vegetables (potatoes, winter squash, turnips, etc.) to the saucepan, sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste.  Add the stock or water and tomatoes and bring to a boil.  Cook for 15 minutes stirring occasionally.

Add the cooked beans, pasta, leafy vegetables and parsley to the saucepan and adjust temperature so the mixture simmers.  Cook for 15 minutes until the vegetables are soft.

Taste and adjust seasonings with salt and pepper, or minced garlic.  Sprinkle parmesan on top if desired.

I like this variant of one of Voltaire’s famous quotes. It sums up a lot of our thinking lately in how we become greener. It boils down to the basic question: “Do we not try, because we can’t be perfect?” Our answer is resoundingly NO. We are not the perfect environmentalists. But we’re hoping to be bit better. We’re attempting to eat more local, which for the most part is an easy decision. However, we’ll still go out for a pizza if we’ve had a rough week. The key is to improve ourselves and continue to make strides forward without sacrificing all the fun. If it becomes a huge chore then it won’t get done like our laundry.

Baby in a pile of laundry

So that’s our plan, we’ll do a little at a time, as much as we can. But when we don’t have the time, it’s too expensive or we can’t accomplish it, we won’t feel bad. And we won’t stop trying to become greener.