I spend most Januarys trying to reset and reboot after the indulgent holiday season by making myself more wholesome, vegetable-heavy meals at home. And right now, that means I'm trying to make sure there are leafy greens in every one of those meals.
But baby it's cold outside. I don't want to eat salads. I want soup. So I'm putting my greens in soup instead, in as many ways as I can think of.
Pureed vegetable soups are a cold-weather standby in my house, and I make them without a recipe with whatever I have on hand. To get my dose of greens into one of these creamy soups, I turn to tender baby spinach.
Once the soup is done cooking, but before pureeing it, I throw in several generous handfuls of baby spinach, which wilts almost instantly into the soup. Then I puree as usual, and garnish with some extra fresh leaves to serve.
Any bean soup can only get better with the addition of greens. I love kale and white beans in almost any combination. Making minestrone? Chop up some kale and stir it into the soup once it's all done. Let it simmer for five minutes or so to wilt the kale and you're good to go.
Making chicken noodle soup? Add some chopped kale, spinach, collards, or chard before adding the noodles and simmer until the greens are tender, 3 to 10 minutes (depending on which kind of green you're using). Asian noodle soups are especially good with dark leafy greens. I love spicy mustard greens in a porky rice noodle soup.
Caldo verde (green soup) is a Portuguese classic, and a favorite winter comfort food of mine. Potatoes and kielbasa are perfectly balanced by an awful lot of kale for a bowl of soup that's equally wholesome and decadent.
Ok, so it's not exactly soup, but I've been making a lot of meat stews recently. To get my greens into this favorite one-pot meal, I stir in some chopped kale just before serving and stir it gently until wilted. If you've made extra stew, only add greens to the portion you're going to be eating: the fresher the greens, the better they taste.
