Crock Pot Pasta e Fagioli Soup

I want to share with you another one of my Christmas cabin favorites!  I'm sure you can imagine cooking for 32 people for 5 days can be a bit of a challenge, when you are trying to find things that everyone will enjoy; yet keeping the cooks from spending too much of their vacation in the kitchen.  For one of our dinners we decided to have a soup night, where each family made a different crock pot soup and everyone got to try a little of each one.  I have to say this was so much fun to do we were all in the kitchen preparing our soup together which turned into some great family time!  

Luckily the cabin we rented had a huge kitchen so there was plenty of room for all of us, and preparing the soups took very little time allowing us to enjoy the rest of our day.  The soups turned out delicious!   

This is a recipe that Alex gave me because she knows how much I love Olive Garden's Pasta e Fagioli Soup, so when she found a copycat recipe on Pinterest she knew I had to have it!  I made this for the first time at the cabin and it was a big hit!

Ingredients:

1 pound ground beef 

1 small onion, finely diced

1 cup shredded carrots 

1 cup sliced celery

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 28oz can crushed tomatoes

2 8oz cans tomato sauce

2 15oz cans beef broth

1 15oz can red kidney beans, with liquid

1 15oz can great northern beans, with liquid

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 teaspoon dried basil

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1/2 cup apple juice

8oz dry ditalini pasta

Parmesan cheese or mozzarella, for serving

You may need to add a little more salt, pepper, oregano, and basil for taste.

Instructions:

Brown ground beef in skillet until no longer pink, lightly seasoning with salt and pepper and add to a large crock pot.  Add onions, carrots, celery, garlic, crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, broth, kidney beans, great northern beans, salt, oregano, basil, thyme, and pepper to the crock pot.

Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours, or until veggies are tender.  When the soup is about ready add in the apple juice, and cook the pasta on the stove in salted water.  Make sure you don't use more than the 8oz of pasta otherwise the soup will get really thick, trust me I made this mistake. Drain the pasta, add it to the soup, and let cook for another 5-10 minutes.  Season to taste if needed.

Ladle into serving bowls.

Top with cheese!

If you love Olive Garden's Pasta e Fagioli you will love this recipe, it is super easy and very delicious!  Hubby must have said a dozen times how much he loves this soup.