Meatball and Pecorino Soup
This Meatball and Pecorino soup is hearty, filling, and healthy! Chicken broth is simmered with kale and tender pork meatballs, and served with extra shaved pecorino cheese. Leftovers keep beautifully!
December!!! =) December is my favorite month of the year, and I couldn’t be happier that that it’s the season for snuggling up in warm fuzzy blankets, making trays and trays of cookies, listening to Christmas music, and eating comfort food. It’s soup season!
I can’t even begin to describe how happy I was to come home to this after a long day out and about. As cliché as it is to say, I’m sure many of you agree that there’s just something about a big bowl of meatball soup in the wintertime. It’s warm, hearty, delicious, and comforting. This is my favorite meatball soup, and it’s got some kale in it and both some grated pecorino in the meatballs, as well as pecorino shavings in the soup.
Meatball and Pecorino Soup
Ingredients
- 1 slice white bread
- 2 tbsp milk
- 3/4 lb ground pork
- 1 garlic clove finely minced
- 2 tbsp grated pecorino romano
- 1/4 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
- 1 egg beaten
- 1 tsp sea salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- 2 tbsp chopped parsley
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 large yellow onion thinly sliced
- 8 oz chopped kale leaves
- 4 cups chicken stock + 1 cup of water rinsed from the box
- 5 sprigs fresh thyme
- pecorino shavings for garnish
Instructions
- Pour the milk over the bread, then break up the bread with your fingers. Add the ground pork, minced garlic, grated pecorino, red pepper flakes, egg, salt, pepper, and parsley. Mix gently but thoroughly.
- If you want perfectly seasoned meatballs to your taste, take a small piece of the meatball mixture and cook it. Make any necessary seasoning adjustments with salt and pepper. Once you are happy with the seasoning, form 1/2 inch balls.
- Heat up a stockpot (preferably a wide one) over medium high heat. Add 3 tbsp olive oil, or enough to coat the bottom of the pan. Fry the meatballs until brown all over, then remove from the pan. Immediately add the sliced onion along with a pinch of salt. Move it around the pan to pick up all the brown bits leftover from the meatballs. Add more olive oil if necessary (I added about a tbsp), and caramelize the onions for 15 minutes over medium low heat.
- Add the kale, chicken stock, thyme and meatballs to the onions in the saucepan and simmer for 30 minutes. Ladle into bowls and garnish with the pecorino shavings. Enjoy!
Nutrition
Nutrition is estimated using a food database and is only intended to be used as a guideline for informational purposes.
11 Comments on “Meatball and Pecorino Soup”
Yep you did it..what a soup…full of so much goodness….
I never had tried Pecorino in soups but sure this will be a hit in our dining table! Yum!
OMG! this looks so good…what I wouldn’t do for a bowl right now.
Kale and meatball soups really does sound phenomenal. yum!
The wind is blowing 60 mph and a snowstorm is on its way. Perfect weather for this perfect soup! So hearty and comforting – can’t be beat!
This is a wonderful soup. It’s strange to read you are starting to feel cold, and you need hot food…today was a sunny and very hot day down here. Be prepared for Chrsitmas means that Summer is here and start melting. But night are still cold, so this soup comes perfect for dinner.
December definitely calls for meatballs and hearty soup! Love that you have kale in here, too — it doesn’t get nearly the veggie love that it should!
I love meatballs but my husband loves them even more. I don’t know about him but I’ve never ever had meatball soup. This would be a nice comfort food to come home to after a long day or even on a snowy day. I’m printing this off. I think it will be my next soup to make which will be very soon. Thanks for sharing the recipe.
Any soup that calls for meatballs and cheese as the main ingredients is great in my book!
I love meatballs, and this soup looks wonderful. We got snow overnight, so I am making soup tonight!! Too bad I already have stuff ready, will have to save this for next time!
This looks delicious, Joanne — perfect for a winter afternoon or evening. Unfortunately, I burned my favorite stock pot last night (forgot I had turned it on) and will be chipping away at carbon before I can make soup. It was a really good stock, too…