Issue Date: September 16, 2001

Recipes in this article: Choose a pound of protein Choose two vegetables Kielbasa and Cabbage Soup Chicken Vegetable Soup Pork Soup with Hominy Fish and Potato Soup Quick Soup Ask Pamela Anderson a food question! Not enough on this page? Here's more recipes!

Supper soups in 30 minutes

Learn an easy formula, and you can put an endless selection of soups on the table any night of the week.

MY FAMILY loves hearty soup for supper. However, homemade soup is at best a two-hour investment -- not the kind of time most working people can spare on weeknights. So I have developed a formula similar to our long-simmered favorites that can be made in about 30 minutes.

The formula is simple: 1 pound of meat, 1 pound of vegetables, 1 quart of chicken broth, 1 onion, 1 cup tomatoes, a starch, and herbs and/or spices. The technique is simple, too: Sauté the onion until softened, add the remaining ingredients to the pot, bring to a simmer, and cook for about 20 minutes. There are a few exceptions, but it's easier to know a formula and remember the exceptions than not to know a formula at all.

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Choose a pound of protein

Avoid meats that require long simmering, such as whole chickens or beef shanks. Instead, buy cuts that cook quickly: pork tenderloin; boneless, skinless chicken thighs (more flavorful than the breasts); boneless ham; Italian and kielbasa-style sausage; shrimp; and firm-fleshed fish.

Fully cooked smoked meats such as ham and kielbasa require no special treatment. Simply cut them into bite-size pieces and add them to the rest of the ingredients. Fresh pork sausage and tenderloin need browning before they are added to the soup. If you're in a hurry, brown them in a separate skillet while the onion sautés. Otherwise, brown them in the soup kettle before sautéing the onion, then add the other ingredients. (The exception: Pork tenderloin dries out quickly, so set it aside after browning and add it to the pot in the last five minutes of cooking.) It's not necessary to fully cook these meats; they finish cooking in the soup.

Shredded chicken and flaked fish give the soup a from-scratch quality. Rather than add raw chunks, drop in whole thighs and fish fillets. Most fish breaks up naturally after simmering a few minutes. For the chicken thighs, simply pull them from the kettle and shred them when they're cool enough to handle, then return the meat to the simmering soup. Shrimp and scallops, like pork tenderloin, are an exception to the formula. They cook so quickly that you should add them during the last five minutes.

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Pick two vegetables

Although some vegetable combinations are better than others -- sausage with cabbage and potatoes, or chicken with carrots and peas -- I can't think of a single vegetable that clashes with any of the suggested meats or fish. For vegetables that need significant trimming (fresh corn, for example), weigh them after trimming. For vegetables that require little trimming (such as zucchini or green beans), just throw them on the kitchen scale. If you don't have a kitchen scale, simply weigh the vegetables at the store -- or just approximate. The soup will be fine with more or less than the suggested pound. While the onion -- which adds depth of flavor -- sautés, prepare the rest of the vegetables, adding them along with the other soup ingredients.

If you haven't finished preparing the vegetables by the time the onion sautés, add the chicken broth and get a head start on simmering. I also have found that a small quantity of tomatoes adds a subtle flavor dimension the soup often needs.

Use chicken broth -- always

The broth for this quick soup is store-bought, not homemade. Use only chicken broth; commercial beef broths generally are inferior. And although clam juice is fine in small quantities, I prefer it in combination with chicken broth or water for a seafood soup.

Pay attention to starch proportions

The starch quantity is not neat and tidy. Besides 1 pound of potatoes, the rest of the starches are different -- 16 ounces of drained beans or hominy, 1/3 cup uncooked rice or orzo, or 4 ounces (2 cups) of egg noodles.

The formula in action: By varying the ingredients, four very different tastes spring from the Quick Soup Formula. Try your own combinations.

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KIELBASA AND CABBAGE SOUP

Protein:
1 pound kielbasa, in 1/2-inch slices
Vegetables:
1/4 medium cabbage, thickly shredded
2 medium carrots, diced
Starch:
1 pound red potatoes (2 large), diced
Herb:
1 tsp. dried thyme leaves
Follow Quick Soup Formula directions.

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CHICKEN VEGETABLE SOUP