Veggie Soup

from “All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten” by Robert Fulghum

Most of what I really need to know about how to live, and what to do, and how to be, I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top the graduate school mountain, but there in the sand box at nursery school.

These are the things I learned. Share everything. Play fair. Don’t hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don’t take things that aren’t yours. Say you are sorry when you hurt somebody. Wash your hands before you eat. Flush. Warm cookies and cold milk are food for you. Live a balanced life. Learn some and think some and draw some and paint and sing and dance and play and work everyday.

Take a nap every afternoon. When you go out in the world, watch for traffic, hold hands, and stick together. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the plastic cup? The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why. We are like that.

And then remember that book about Dick and Jane and the first word you learned, the biggest word of all: LOOK! Everything you need to know is there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation, ecology, and politics and the sane living.

Think of what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about 3 o’clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap. Or we had a basic policy in our nation and other nations to always put thing back where we found them and clean up our own messes. And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out in the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.

When I saw this chart board in my daughter's kindergarten class I was reminded of Robert Fulghum's short essay. A kindergarten's vegetable soup recipe seems so simple and uncomplicated compared to the recipe I am sharing today :)

Crock-pot Vegetable Soup  

Cook's note: The beauty of this hearty soup is its versatility. You can add whatever vegetables you have on hand, add pasta or potatoes, use hamburger or beef stew cubes ,cook it on the stove or in a crock pot, it is easy to put together and it freezes well. 

I served the soup with garlic bread sticks from the freezer section  grocery store.

Ingredients:

• 1-LB hamburger or 1-LB beef stew cubes
• 1 can chunky tomatoes (garlic and basil)
• 1 can corn
• 1 cup chopped celery
• 1 cup chopped carrots 
• 2 cups fresh green beans
• 3 red potatoes cubed or 1/2 box dried pasta shells
• 1 medium chopped onion
• 1 can low sodium beef broth
• 1 small can V 8 juice
• 1/2 cup dry red wine
• 3 peppercorns
• 1 tsp. minced garlic (comes in a jar)
• 1 bay leaf 
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 3 cups water
•  2 tsp. sugar
• 2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tsp red wine vinegar

Directions:

• Brown hamburger with onion and drain if using beef stew cubes add flour in a zip loc bag and shake cubes in it and brown them in oil with onion
• Add rest of ingredients to meat in a crock-pot 
• Cook on low about 7 hours