The broccoli soup of a few weeks back has officially entered our rotation. I've eaten my way through two entire batches, and upped the ingredients for freezer storage. I'm not sure why broccoli purée is so much more appealing to me than whole florets, but I'm not going to question it. Puréed broccoli it is.

While I was at it, I decided to increase the freezer store with a batch of tiny lamb meatballs, inspired by Choosy Beggars' meatballs 101.

Lamb meatballs

Mix 1/2 pound ground lamb with several cloves of finely minced garlic, a similarly finely minced hot pepper, one piece of bread chopped into small pieces (or a big handful of breadcrumbs), a big spoonful of plain yogurt, and some salt and pepper. Roll into meatballs of your chosen size; mine were about an inch in diameter. Bake at 450F for 5-8 minutes, or until cooked through. You can test doneness by breaking open a meatball to check out the color (right before you eat it).

I ate a few meatballs right away in a simple pasta with marinara, but the rest of the batch--probably something like 50 little meatballs--went right into the freezer.

So. With half a batch of broccoli soup in the freezer, I can eat lunch at a moment's notice. With the soup plus a container of frozen lamb meatballs, I can make said lunch even better. And hey, why not throw in some beet greens for good measure?

Broccoli meatball soup with greens

frozen broccoli soup
frozen precooked lamb meatballs
a splash of water
a handful of beet greens (or whatever green you have on hand)
a little bit of parsley

Warm a splash or two of water in a little pan. Add the chunk of frozen soup, cover, and let melt. Check the pot occasionally to make sure you have enough liquid to avoid scorching. I also like to scrape the block of melting broth to speed up the process a little bit.

When your soup has melted completely, bring it to a simmer and add a handful of frozen meatballs. Cook for 3 to 5 minutes, or until both soup and meatballs are hot through. In the last minutes or so of cooking, add a handful of washed chopped beet greens. If you want to use other greens, chard, spinach, arugula, or escarole would all be good here. You may want to add particularly tender greens off the heat after your soup is done cooking.

Serve, add some chopped parsley, and eat. Voila! Lunch in under ten minutes!