Month: May 2022

Spring Green Herb Soup with Roasted Garbanzo Beans

There is something so special about this soup. It is a beautiful mix of green vegetables and herbs. It is surprizing light and delicate with an appealing color and aromatic flavor. It is earthy and speaks all things healthy. Served piping hot or as a gazpacho, this soup makes an elegant light main course.

Spring Green Herb Soup with Roasted Garbanzo Beans

Ingredients

  • 3 scallions cut in pieces (use the entire scallot)
  • 1 large bunch of fresh broccoli (cut in pieces and disgard the hard stems)
  • 2 cups fresh spinach
  • 1 cup fresh parsley
  • 1/2 cup fresh basil
  • 1 avocado (cut in pieces)
  • 4 cups vegetable stock
  • 1 15.5 oz. can garbanzo beans drained (I use Bush’s reduced or no sodium)
  • 2 tsps. black pepper (or more depending on preference)
  • 1 cup fat-free plain Greek yogurt

Directions

  1. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or a silicone mat and place the garbanzo beans on top. Roast in a 425 degree oven for approximately 20 minutes or until the beans are slightly browned and split open. Set aside.
  2. Place the scallions in a soup pot with 1/4 cup of water and saute until softened.
  3. Add the broccoli and vegetable both and simmer until broccoli is soft.
  4. Add the spinach, parlsey and basil and cook until the spinach is wilted.
  5. Remove from the stove and set aside until the mixture cools a bit. Add the avocado. Slowly pour into a high speed blender, a little bit at a time, and puree.
  6. Pour the mixture back into the soup pot. Add the black pepper and roasted garbanzo beans and stir. Add 3/4 cup fat-free greek yogurt.
  7. Serve the soup piping hot and garnish with a small amount of the remaining yogurt and parsley.
The roasted garbanzo beans give this soup substance but are also a great snack when spinkled with red pepper flakes, cajun seasoning, black pepper, garlic or onion powder. These are best eaten right out of the oven when they are the crispiest.
Adding the garbanzos to the soup
Adding with fat-free plain greek yogurt
This soup is 100 percent delicious!
Enjoying leftovers the next day. This time I added red pepper flakes and paired it with a few multigrain wasa crackers.

Cucumber Juice Cocktail

Spring is a time of rebirth, regrowth and renewal. It is also a time of new beginnings, new life, new promise and brand new opportunities. It is a time when trees wake up from their long winters nap and redress their branches with new leaves, buds and blossoms. It is a time when tiny shoots bravely poke their way through the earth, animals wake up from hibernation and birds return back from migration. With everything in nature starting over so fresh and new, there can be no better time to make positive changes. Springtime gives everyone an open invitation to explore personal growth and development. It is an opportunity to spring clean our lives – mind, body and spirit.

Cucumber Juice Cocktail

Cucumber, green apple, lemon and ginger juice cocktail

The credits for this delightful juice cocktail go to Shanon Sterringer who is the pastor at The Hildegard Haus in the Village of Fairport Harbor and author of Forbidden Grace. As she put it, “I created a little bit of sunshine inside with my juicer.” I couldn’t run fast enough to the grocery store to pick up the ingredients to create a little sunshine in my life. And it did just that!

2 unpeeled cucumber, 1 lemon, 1 green apple and a piece of peeled ginger
Liquid sunshine
I juiced the cucumbers first, then removed the pulp from the juicer and made cucumber water for later.