Saturday Dinners - Vegetable Stew

Today was a cloudy, dreary, cold day in Greeley.

So James and I decided that a slowly cooked delicious vegetable stew was in order for our Saturday date night.  James is rather a connoisseur of soups and sauces and marinades, so I was guided by him in what to toss together.

Ingredients
46 fl. oz. - Low Sodium V8 juice
32 fl. oz - Imagine Organic Beef Broth
1/2 box - Barilla whole grain medium shells
3 potatoes, diced
2 whole summer squash, quartered
2 white corn cobs, shaved
1 lb. fresh green beans, sliced in to four sections
1 onion, diced
1 green pepper, diced
2 sweet peppers, diced
2 cloves of garlic, finely diced

We started chopping up vegetables at about noon.  This allowed us to let all the flavors simmer together for hours (and pretty much be lazy the rest of the day).  Zoe made a guest appearance in the living room while we chopped. 

 

The fresh veggies were added in to our giant soup pot, then all of the V8 and the broth.  We cut on the heat at just above low to allow it plenty of time to simmer.  The noodles were set aside to be added later - we didn't want them getting too soggy.

Don't all the veggies look super delicious?  Also, note the Tupperware on the left side of the pot.  We've started chopping all of our veggies every weekend after grocery shopping and tossing them in Tupperware to be used in various recipes throughout the week.  This makes weekday cooking so much easier and quicker.

Six hours later, we added in the noodles and headed out to the dog park to exercise the pup.  

And, because I'm a wonderful fiance, I made James one of his favorite things when we got home.

Eight hours after starting the meal, we finally sat down to eat.

Overall the meal was pretty good.  The liquid boiled down more than we'd expected, so it ended up being much more stew-like and less soup-like than originally intended, but it was delicious.  And My Fitness Pal clocked one serving of soup and corn bread at only 372 calores and 7 grams of fat, so it was crazy healthy on a workout rest day.

And, extra bonus, the time at the dog park definitely worked.