Ok, friends. You might need a little end-of-winter pick me up. How about a soup recipe? I mean, the weather is still cold, so soup is good, but you need something that reminds you of spring, right? Something that hints good things are around the corner? This one tastes like a ray of pillowy, lemony sunshine. I highly recommend it. What is it, you ask? Well, it's Greek meatball soup with avgolemono. Don't worry, it's not that complicated.
First, you're going to need some good broth, so you need to do a little bit of preparation. We roast a chicken about once a week, so we always make a pot of broth after that. I use the whole pot of broth to make a whole pot of soup, so that's the kind of quantity we're talking about. (rocket science, I tell you)
Now, to make your soup, chop up an onion and a carrot and saute them in a nice amount of olive oil.
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| onions |
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| carrots |
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| you know how to do this, right? |
If you have a helper in your kitchen, get them to chop up a stick of celery too, though it's not really necessary.
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| my lovely assistant hacks up a stalk of celery |
Get it cooking nicely, softening up. Add some salt and pepper, a bay leaf, and whatever else you deem necessary to a good soup. Then add your broth and bring that to a boil.
While your yummies are cooking, get your meatballs ready. I used 300g of ground pork and 1/4 cup of rice.
Just mix the meat with the rice (the rice is uncooked - it will cook in the soup) and form it into small meatballs, about 1 inch diameter. Then roll them in flour so they don't break apart when you put them in the soup. I used rice flour because we have a newly diagnosed gluten problem in our house, and I prefer to keep everyone's digestion working as it should, but you can use whatever flour you want. You can also use breadcrumbs instead of rice, but the rice is kind of fun and very soft and lovely when cooked.
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| ricey meatballs |
When your soup is simmering away, turn the heat down so it's a very gentle simmer, then gently lower your meatballs in. Let them cook gently for 20 mins or so.
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| lowering in the meatballs with a slotted spoon |
To prepare the avgolemono, you'll need 2 or 3 eggs, one lemon and a sense of adventure. It's not that hard, but you've probably never done it before. But also, don't worry! If you screw it up, it still tastes good. Beat your egg whites until they're foamy, then beat in the egg yolks (you don't have to separate them if you don't want to, but it makes it fluffier if you do), and add the juice of one lemon.
Turn the heat off for your soup, and have a ladle and a lid handy. Next you need to temper your eggs, so take a small ladle of soup and add it to your eggs then stir it up. Add another one, and probably another one and another one - you want your egg mixture to be quite hot. Then add your eggs to the soup, and give it a folding stir. Put the lid on the pot, and let it sit there, cooking the eggs (but remember, no heat). You have enough time to put the dressing on your salad, cut some bread, and set the table.
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| this is what the pot of soup looks like once it has sat for a few minutes |
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when your kids are clamouring for dinner, you're excused from
having your soup spill out the sides of your bowl for the photo. |
Then, ladle it out into bowl and enjoy. My kids devour this stuff. My avgolemono didn't turn out perfectly this time as I was a little hasty in the tempering stage, but it was still nice. When it's perfect, it transforms the texture of the whole soup into a fluffy and delicate spoonful of cloud. It's a delight. Plus the meatballs with their rice are so tender, you'll wonder why you never had any before, and soon you'll be planning when to have it again!
