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Soup with lentils and meatballs

Lentil and Meatball Soup

Wonderfully tasty, hearty, and warming — a lunch for the whole family! Lentil and meatball soup is very easy to make and turns out as an incredibly rich, vivid first course. Serve it with sour cream or just on its own with a sprinkle of ground allspice. The handy thing is that you can swap and combine the vegetables however you like.

Pearl

Recipe author

Composition / ingredients

Servings:

Red lentils

Ground meat

400

Potatoes

Onions (small)

Carrot

Bell pepper (small)

Tomato

Vegetable oil

Bay leaf

Salt

Fresh herbs

Water (or broth)

1500

Translation table of volumetric measures

Nutrients and energy value of the composition of the recipe

By weight of the composition:

Proteins 20 % 3 g

Fats 40 % 6 g

Carbohydrates 40 % 6 g

86 kcal

GI: 100 / 0 / 0

Cooking method

Cooking time: 40 min

Step 1:

How do you make soup with red lentils and meatballs? Gather everything on the list. Which ground meat is best for the meatballs? Absolutely any will do — mixed meat, beef, pork, or poultry. I used store-bought ground pork.
Step 2:

Peel the potatoes, onions, and carrot, and rinse all the vegetables under clean running water. Seed and core the bell pepper. Peel the tomato if you like.
Step 3:

Finely chop one onion and add it to the ground meat. Season with salt to taste and mix well. You can also add your favorite spices and some garlic powder if you like.
Step 4:

Scoop up the meat with a teaspoon and roll it into a small ball. Roll the rest of the meat into little meatballs the same way.
Step 5:

Rinse the lentils several times until the water runs clear. Cut the potatoes into small cubes or sticks.
Step 6:

Bring the water or broth to a boil in a pot. Add the potatoes, meatballs, and lentils. Once it boils, salt to taste and lower the heat to moderate. Cook the soup until the potatoes and meatballs are done — about 15 to 25 minutes.
Step 7:

Meanwhile, make the sauté. Grate the carrot on a coarse grater. Coarsely chop the second onion and the bell pepper.
Step 8:

Cut the tomato into medium cubes.
Step 9:

In a skillet with vegetable oil, sauté the onion, carrot, and pepper until everything is soft. Stir the vegetables so nothing scorches.
Step 10:

Once the potatoes are soft, add the sautéed vegetables, the tomato, and the bay leaf to the pot. (The bay leaf is optional.) Bring it back to a boil, stir in the finely chopped herbs, and take the pot off the heat.
Step 11:

Let the soup rest for 10–15 minutes, then serve.

This soup is a big hit with grown-ups and kids alike. On cold fall and winter evenings it warms you up and fills you up. The amounts here gave me a medium-thick soup. Enjoy!
Important! Whether or not the recipe specifies an amount of water, it's best to go by your own preference (thick or thinner soup), the size of your pot, and the ingredients you're using. Keep in mind that the author's idea of how much meat, potato, grain, and so on belongs in the soup may not match yours. In practice, if you're making it for the first time, don't cook a whole pot right away — make a tasting batch for one or two people. To do that, scale all the ingredients down to 1–2 servings and figure the water at about one cup per serving for a very thick soup, up to 1.5–2 cups for a thinner one. Remember that some liquid boils off during cooking. After tasting a small portion, you can adjust both the liquid and the proportions to your taste. Before long, like most seasoned cooks, you'll be adding water and ingredients by eye.
An easy way to peel tomatoes: wash them, score a shallow cross in the top with a sharp knife, and drop them into boiling water for 1–2 minutes. Take them out, cool them slightly, and slip off the skins.
Since everyone's preference for salt, sweetness, bitterness, heat, acidity, and pungency is different, always add spices and seasonings to your own taste! If you're using a seasoning for the first time, keep in mind that some are especially easy to overdo (chili pepper, for one).