The Best Soup Ever...Seriously

I am not a huge soup fan. I mean, I like it, but a lot of times, I don't love it. And as we have previously established, I do not like leftovers. So leftover soup to me is...well...ick. Until I came across this recipe. This soup has changed my view on soup forever. I made this on Wednesday and we were having it for leftovers on Thursday as well. Wednesday night I went to bed excited that we would have the leftover soup the next day. Thursday morning I woke up thinking about the soup. All day I could not wait for Mr J to get home so we could have the soup. So I thought I needed to share this recipe

Italian Sausage Soup with Tortellini

(adapted from Allrecipes.com)

• 1 pound sweet Italian sausage, casings removed
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 4 cloves garlic, minced (we love to keep the vampires away!)
• 6 cups beef broth
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/2 cup red wine...must use this! Do not substitute!
• 1 Jar canned tomates (These were from my mother-in-law, but you could totally use chopped or diced canned tomatoes. I would use the larger size can. Also you could use real tomatoes. That is what the orginal recipe called for, but you were to peel, seed and chop. That was too much work! :) )
• 1/2 bag of "match stick" carrots. (You could chop your own, but that is more work!)
• A large dose of Italian Seasoning. (I probably used one to two tablespoons. I didn't measure. Just eye-balled)
• 1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
• 2 decent size zucchini, sliced
• 1 bag frozen tortellini pasta
• 
  

1. In a 5 quart Dutch oven, brown sausage. Remove sausage and drain, reserving 2 tablespoon of the drippings. (I just reserved all in the pan...oops)
2. Saute onions and garlic in drippings (Seriously, if you do not have the pampered chef garlic press, hit me up and we will get you one ordered. It will forever change your views on fresh garlic!).
3. Stir in beef broth, water, wine, tomatoes, italian seasoning, tomato sauce, and sausage. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer uncovered for 30 minutes.
4. Skim fat from the soup. This is kind of difficult, but you need to do it. Stir in zucchini and carrots. Simmer covered for 30 minutes to an hour. Add tortellini during the last 10 minutes. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese on top of each serving.

Enjoy!

Let me know if you thought this was as good as we did! This will be around all winter in this house!