recipe: minestrone?

last week i decided that i was going to try and make crock pot recipes during lent that can do double duty as meatless and meatful.  yesterday was my first attempt.  i didn't follow a recipe but threw in a bunch of ingredients to see what would happen.  here's what i did:

what you'll need:

1. a big can of diced tomatoes (28 oz?)
2. a big container of veggie stock (4 cups?)...clearly i need to pay more attention
3. tomato paste
4. zuchinni
5. onion
6. peppers
7. green beans
8. peas
9. corn
10. lima beans (7-10 were in the same bag of frozen vegetables)
11. a can of garbanzo beans
12. a can of kidney beans (or whatever beans you like)
13. left over butter nut squash from your lentils
14. garlic (i used jarred from trader joe's.  this girl doesn't mince garlic)
15. dry oregano
16. dry basil (be creative with how much)
17. salt
18. pepper
19. optional: cheese tortellini
20. optional: chicken sausage

what you do:

1. combine diced tomatoes, veggie stock, tomato paste, zucchini, onion (i'd add any fresh vegetables you're using now) garbanzo beans, kidney beans, garlic, oregano, salt and pepper in crock pot and cook for 8 hours on low.

2. you can eat the above as a great vegetarian and dairy free meal.  at this point i put some soup in a separate container and added the tortellini to the container and the crock pot (this way when you add the sausage there's already some soup that remains meat free).

3. in both containers i added my peppers, mixed veg and butternut squash.

4. in just the crock pot i added the chopped sausage.  at this point i let the new ingredients warm through for about a half hour but going longer would be just fine.  my husband got home and we were hungry.

5. then we added some parmesan cheese and ate.

all in all it was really good.  i enjoyed the sausage for dinner and am looking forward to the meat free version on friday for lunch.  i didn't add salt originally because i forgot but would recommend it.  it was kind of tomato-y.  anyway, try it out anyway that looks good to you but feel free to add or subtract based on what you have on hand.

i promise i will bake some time in the month of march.  i took until februrary to kill the Christmas cookies but i'm ready to go again!