Beef Vegetable Soup

This is a recipe from my childhood. I will admit, I never liked vegetable soup when I was a kid. However, after a while, I found that it was good when I put the vegetables on a cracker and ate it that way.

Now that I am grown up, I find that this is a fantastic tasting soup on its own, without the crackers. My mom would always use beef roast meat cut into cubes. She did not buy stew meat because that was always more expensive than just a regular roast. Beef stew meat is still expensive, and I don’t mind cutting up the roast myself.

The recipe calls for simmering for 1 hour, but I have found that if you put a lid on the pot and simmer for most of the day, you will get a much better tasting soup. It gives the flavors a chance to marry and the meat to become tender.

Ingredients

2 lbs. hamburger or beef roast meat
1 large onion chopped
3 c. tomatoes, diced
2 medium carrots, sliced
2 c. cubed potatoes
1/2 c. diced celery
1 sweet pepper, chopped
1 tsp. salt
1/4 c. rice
Pepper to taste
1 or 2 bay leaves (Optional)
8 c. water

Directions

Brown hamburger or cut up beef roast, onions and sweet pepper together in a cast iron skillet. Season with salt, and pepper. You can also use garlic and onion powder as well.

In a large sauce pot, combine tomatoes, carrots, potatoes, celery, salt, rice, pepper and water. Begin heating while the hamburger or roast cooks.

When the meat is done, drain off excess grease. Add the hamburger, or roast, onions and sweet peppers to the pot of vegetables.

Bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer for 1 hour. You can also make this in a crock-pot.

Serve with bread or crackers. Remove the bay leaves as these are not edible.