Italian Wedding Soup

by Ina Garten

Preheat oven to 350 F degrees

Combine the ground chicken, chicken sausage, bread crumbs, garlic, parsley, both cheeses, milk, egg, salt and pepper . . . . 

. . . .until well combined.

With a teaspoon, drop 1 to 1 1/2 inch meatballs onto a sheet pan lined with parchment paper.  They don't have to be perfectly round.

Bake for 30 minutes until cooked through and browned, set aside.  Resist the temptation of popping too many of these into your mouth.  Otherwise, there won't be any left for the soup.

In the meantime, heat the oil in a heavy bottom pot.  Throw in the carrots, onions and the celery.  Saute' until  softened, about 5-6 minutes.  This is my favorite part, I just love smelling the wonderful aroma rising up to my nostrils, I could stand there all day.

 Pour in the chicken stock and wine and bring to a boil.  Add the pasta to the simmering broth and cook for 6-8 minutes.  Add the fresh dill then the meatballs and simmer for 1 minute.  Taste for salt and pepper.

Add the spinach.  Can you believe this will wither down to almost nothing??  Cook for 1 minute until it has all wilted.

Ladle into soup bowls, sprinkle with parmesan cheese.

Barefoot Contessa is one of the cooking shows I DVR.  When it's my turn to watch whatever I want on tv, I choose my recorded cooking shows.  Ina Garten cooked this Italian Wedding Soup recently and I'm so glad I got to DVR it.  To say I was ecstatic is putting it lightly.  About 12 years ago, I was introduced to Italian Wedding Soup at a small, family owned Italian restaurant down the road from where I worked named, "Gaetano's".    I work in a college football office and the coaches were going there for lunch and asked me if I wanted something from there.  I couldn't decide so one of the coaches said he would bring me some "Italian Wedding Soup".  I'd never heard of it but since I love soup, I was all for it.  This soup was like no soup I had ever tasted.  I was also a little surprised that it didn't have any tomatoes in it.  It was a brothey soup, with little eeensy pasta bits, adorable small meatballs with a wonderful savory, Italian flavor to it. They also served it with an amazing bread roll smothered in garlicky butter.  I loved it so much that that was the only item I ordered from their menu up until they closed a couple years later :(  So sad.

I have tried the Progresso version, as well as the Wegmans version and neither one have come close.  I've seen recipes for it, never desired to give them a try I don't know until I saw Ina making hers!  Can I tell how you how excited I was when I decided to make this recipe?  As I watched Ina cooking it, I would pause the DVR as she threw out the ingredients and directions for me to type and keep a record of it.  I woke up the next morning, planning my trip to the store after work which is what I did.  I got home and already had dinner waiting for me (thx to my wonderful hubby) but I had to hold myself back to stop from making the soup.  I just couldn't wait!!  We had to take our kitty to the vet this morning so I couldn't wait to get home to start on the soup!!  

If you take a close look at those meatballs, I tell you, they can be eaten just by themselves.  I don't know how many I popped into my mouth until it was time to put them into the soup.  Even hubby said they were good by themselves.  We're both convinced they'd make a good fingerfood for our Super Bowl party.  Hope you're having a good weekend.  If it's frigid cold outside where you live, how about serving some delicious hot soup??

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