It's My 500th Post

Wow! All that means is that over the past 3 years, I've had quite a bit of nothing to share about my typical, boring life. Lots of bloggers out there like to do a give away to celebrate blogging milestones, but I don't have corporate sponsors who give me free stuff to giveaway, so there will not be a random drawing for some prize that you may or may not want but entered the drawing anyway because it was free. I am going to give something to every reader and blog-stalker though... a recipe!

I found this recipe in the most recent Costco Connection magazine. It appealed to me because it was a crock-pot recipe, meat-free, easy to make, and cheap! Really, I think you can make the soup for less than $1.50 total (and it feeds 4!). I made the recipe for dinner last night. It took maybe 5 minutes to prepare, if I diced the vegetables really, r-e-a-l-l-y slowly, then 8 hours in the crock-pot, then, yum! This recipe is really yummy (even Jonathan thought it smelled good, but he still wouldn't try it) and it makes me excited for fall... it's fall food and I'm sure it's going to taste even better when it's cool and crisp outside instead of 85 degrees! Here's the recipe...

French Lentil Rice Soup
6 Cups Broth
1 Cup Lentils (picked over and rinsed)
3 Tbsp uncooked Rice
2 Carrots, peeled and finely diced
2 stalks Celery, finely diced
1 small Onion, finely diced
2 Tbsp. minced Garlic
1 tsp. dried Thyme
1/2 tsp. Salt
1/8 tsp ground Pepper
1/4 C Sour Cream (optional)
1/4 C chopped Parsley (optional)

Dump everything except for the sour cream and parsley in a crock-pot and stir it up. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours. Remove 1 1/2 C soup from pot and puree it. Dump it back into the crock-pot and stir it together. Ladle soup into bowls. Top with sour cream and parsley, if desired (we didn't). Eat.

Simple and really good. The lentils and rice are fluid suckers so have extra broth on hand to add to the soup so it's "soupy" the way you like it instead of more like a side dish (or leave it thick and serve it as a side dish). Last night when I put the leftovers in the refrigerator, the soup was still "soupy", but the lentils and rice continued to absorb the fluid and by lunchtime today, it was thick again (but still so good).

So happy 500th blog post to me and enjoy the recipe!