Italian Wedding Soup is a favorite in our house. Nice, simple, earthy broth, meatballs, and pasta? What is not to like? We actually served this at our wedding (shh, nevermind that we are Greek, not Italian :)

This is a really great recipe, if I do say so  myself. I add a little more broth than necessary because the pasta sucks it all up in the fridge for leftovers but of course you could reduce the broth slightly and/or cook the pasta separately.

Italian Wedding Soup

Meatballs
1/2 lb. ground  beef
1/2 small onion, grated
2 tbsp. grated parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp bread crumbs
1/2 tablespoon fresh basil
3/4 tsp dried parsley (obviously you could  use about 2T fresh but I didn’t have any on hand)
1 egg white

Combine all ingredients and make into 1/2″ meatballs. Simple enough, huh? I usually refrigerate mine for a couple hours or up to a day to meld the flavors/firm them up a bit.

Soup
2 tbsp butter
1 small onion, diced
1/2 cup sliced carrots
1/2 cup sliced celery
1 clove minced garlic
2 sprigs of fresh thyme (leaves)
8 cups chicken broth
salt and pepper to taste
3/4 cup acini di pepi or other small pasta
8 oz. fresh spinach or escarole or curly endive or……..

Melt butter in stockpot. Add onion, celery, carrots, garlic and thyme, and cook until veggies get tender, but not too soft.

Add chicken broth and bring to a boil. Turn heat down a bit and simmer about 20-30  minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Drop  in meatballs and cook about 5 minutes before dropping in acini di pepi. Cook about 6 more minutes  before adding spinach. Cook spinach 2-3 minutes.