Quick and Easy Pantry Meal: Pasta and Bean Soup

I like to eat soups, especially in the fall and winter.  My children not so much, but I just give them pasta with butter and then make what I want for dinner. I have found that if you keep chicken stock in your pantry, pasta, beans, and canned tomatoes, then you can pretty much make some type of soup.

I made this soup recently by rummaging through my pantry and old cookbooks. It's a great soup using pasta.

Pasta and Bean Soup

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of olive oil plus a little more for drizzling

4 large cloves of garlic, minced

2 teaspoons of fresh or dried rosemary

2 14 oz diced tomatoes

Salt and Pepper

7 cups of chicken stock

6 ounces of pasta (elbow or tiny shells)

2 19-ounce cans of cannellini beans, drained and rinsed. 

Instructions:

Heat oil in a large stockpot. Add garlic and rosemary and saute for about two minutes. Add the tomatoes plus salt and pepper. Simmer for several minutes. 

Add the chicken stock and bring soup to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for five minutes. Add the pasta and cook 7 to 10 minutes. 

Add the canned beans to the pot and simmer for several minutes.  Add salt and pepper, if needed. Once the soup is in serving bowls, drizzle with olive oil to taste. 

Serve with my cornbread. 

This soup is excellent later in the week. It also makes enough to freeze. 

Are you a soup lover, too?

Updated 2019

My thanks to Louisiana Eye and Laser, with offices in Monroe, Louisiana, for being an October HinesSightBlog sponsor. The Monroe location offers routine eye care to LASIK eye surgeries.