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Comment by voidfunc | Hacker News Reader

Im nowhere near the extreme of this guy but I cook a vegetable soup and eat it 4-6 days a week every week for dinner. I save the calories and good (edit: interesting) cooking for restaurants.

I mess around with the soup occasionally trying new flavoring or techniques but its the same damn soup and I like it. Its easy to make, keeps well, costs nothing relative to output, and leaves me time to think about other things other than food. Also its very healthy.

At this point its just a habit. Sunday or Monday evening is soup making time. Two hours nets me two weeks of food.

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Before I had a family, I did this too. You really grow to appreciate food more by keeping it low key so often. And I agree, it’s relatively healthy. You kind of eat well on autopilot.

Then when you have something different and special, it really is special.

My family loves to have something great for every single meal. It’s very excessive and unnecessary - but I keep it to myself and let them enjoy it. It’s not a bad or destructive habit at all, I just wonder often if they value or appreciate it as much as they could.

Totally understand this would be hard to pull off with a family. My friends think Im a bit weird (I probably am), and im totally capable of cooking more interesting things, but its a lot of effort for very little personal satisfaction.

Plus theres so much excellent food out there, created by culinary experts, that I love to try. I save the fun for the pros :3

I also eat the same dinner ~6 days of the week, largely for the same reasons of practicality. Being able to prepare dinner on Sunday saves loads of time during the week.

and whats the recipe?

1 onion 2-3 carrots 2 potatoes 2-3 celery sticks 1 fennel heart 1 red pepper 1-2 tomatoes (optional) Canillini beans

2 bayleaves salt and pepper suit to taste. 2qt water cook/simmer for 1-2hr

I muck around with it sometimes... thrown siracha, hot peppers, sausage in it to varying degrees of tastiness.

I generally sauté the onions, celery and fennel together then add the rest. It can all be done in one pot for convenience.

You could easily tweak this to be similar to something I grew up with, from Slovenia: https://www.tasteatlas.com/manestra Maybe cook longer and blend some of it to thicken it up.

Ours typically had pork and Polish sausage added, plus this type of pasta: https://www.google.com/search?q=Ditalini&safe=off&source=lnm...

It's similar to what Italians would know of as Pasta e fagioli (pasta and beans) but obviously varies by region, even village by village.

Very familiar with pasta fagioli (Italian heritage). Ill check this out tho, thanks!

If you cook the pasta in the soup, it will significantly shorten its shelf life.

Better cook it separately and add it to the current portion you are eating.

Pasta e fagioli, o coi fagioli

If it's about heritage get it right, it's worth it.

The funny thing is that we call that minestra in Italy. I keep being pleasantly surprised by how food is just different shades when you move from country to country...

That's just a weird Croatian name - it's mostly called minestra everywhere.. :)

I'm italian and thank you for reminding me that we have that deliciousness. I don't know why I don't make it more often.

Get a pressure cooker and cut it down to 30 mins...with bonus that you don't need to watch it because it switches to keep warm after timer

Do you just keep it on the refrigerator for the whole week or do you freeze it ?

Why freeze it if you keep it in the fridge for just one week? Depending on what it is, but generally most things last just fine for a week or more in the fridge.

They're probably asking because it depends on the quantity they're making.

I had a friend who asked me if he could freeze the soup recipe I sent him and while confused I told him it shouldn't be an issue.

Later on I'm visiting and he tells me he's making that soup. I walk into the kitchen to see a 40qt/37L pot being cooked. No wonder why he was asking if he could freeze it because the poor fella would have needed to eat 3L of soup a day to finish before it went bad if he didn't freeze it.

It keeps fine in the fridge for two weeks.

It reminds me of this recipe:

https://youtu.be/3DxS-CIJFj8

Here’s another similar recipe:

https://youtu.be/3DxS-CIJFj8

This kind of thing is an old tradition and common. Good way to use up leftovers as well.

I'm sure I've read that the more varied your diet the more calories you will consume.

Of course we are advised to have a varied diet but I suspect that is because most people have such poor eating habits. If you can squeeze all the nutrients you need into a single dish then why wouldn't it work.

Do you eat something together with the soup?

No, not really. I usually eat a pear or apple afterwards depending on season. And then a granola bar for dessert.

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