Atleast Something Turned Out Right: Soup

Oh my gosh.  Final are finally over.  And I'm rather mad, to say the least, at the GPA grading system. In three of my classes, I was one point below almost maxing out.  I think that would make anyone really ticked off.  I was just so frustrated.  Especially when one of those classes was AP .  One more stinking point, and I could have been so happy.  I would actually be really excited right now, because I actually did score really high, but that one point thing just does not rest well with me.  A 92 is much higher than a 90, BUT they get you the same GPA.  This is total injustice, and I want a refund.  Why did I try so hard then?  I could have pulled off a bunch of 90's, without studying so hard I was about to cry.  I think that schools should get rid of GPA, and just stick with raw numbers, because that would make life so much easier and more fair.  Let's think about it.  Colleges have to compare GPAs on different point scales from different schools.  If schools did away with GPA then colleges would not have to deal with any of that converting junk, because everyone does the hundred point scale at first.  And that is what I think.  I know, too, that a lot of people agree with me, because I have heard more that one person steaming about being one point away from getting .3 points higher. 

And that was the brunt of my day.  Being steaming mad about my GPA. 

But oh, atleast something turned out according to my wishes- this soup.  Umm, yum, yum.  It was just the thing to warm me and M up, because we had been shopping earlier in the evening out in the cold.  The soup got all nice and thick, and it was just had an excellent and deep flavour.  A perfect soup to warm up a cold person, and it made a ton, too, so leftovers galore for us.  Actually, it made so much that I could not fit the pasta in the pot with the other ingredients, so we had to add that to the bowls seperately.  And I had all my pasta at the end of my soup, becuase it's kind of hard to stir a super full bowl of soup with the bowl that I was using.  Who cares!  It was amazing, and so thick, and chock full of veggies.

“Sausage”, Veggie, and Pasta Soup

Serves 8-10

Adapted from Kalyn’s Kitchen

1 onion, chopped

3 carrots, coined

6 cloves garlic, pressed

4 small red potatoes, diced

5 cups water

28 oz can petite diced tomatoes

2 tbsp “chicken” bullion

1 tbsp ground fennel

3 sprigs rosemary, leaves removed from stems and chopped

8 oz penne pasta or other small pasta, cooked until al dente
2 cups “ham”, cut into bite-sized pieces
2 tbsp corn starch mixed with 2 tbsp water
Freshly ground salt and pepper to taste
Heat a large Dutch oven over medium high heat. Sauté the onion, carrots, and garlic for five minutes, until the onion starts to become tender. Add the potatoes, and cook for a couple more minutes. Add the water through the rosemary, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to just over a simmer and cover for about 20 minutes, until the potatoes are almost tender. Add the remaining ingredients except salt and pepper, and cook for 10 minutes more. Serve, topped with salt and pepper.