I went to the freezer to grab some meat for supper….I came across an oxtail. Hmm…soup I think. I never know how much meat is on them and I wanted to make a big batch of soup so I grabbed a package of sirloin steak. Meat is something we get from the farmer that Hubby works for so using a steak to make soup is something I take for granted far to often.
I ended up putting the frozen steak and oxtail into the Instant Pot. I added 6 cups of water along with 4 Tablespoons of beef soup base, salt and pepper to taste. I set it on meat for 60 minutes. I needed that oxtail meat to fall off the bone….and after 60 minutes with a quick release, it was perfect. I took the meat out of the pot, set it aside to cool, and then added ice cubes. I always but ice cubes in the beef broth that I cook meat in. The broth tends to be greasy and fatty. If I put the ice cubes in the broth the fat adheres to the ice cubes. Then once the fatty grease is stuck to the ice cubes, I scoop the ice cubes out and the fat comes with.
While the meat was cooking I prepped some veggies..Here’s what I put together:
1 large chopped potato
2 small onions chopped
1 1/2 cups carrots chopped
1 can diced tomatoes-juice included
2 ribs of celery chopped
1/2 can corn
1/2 can beans
1/2 can peas
I have the half cans left over from the childcare kids. Any left over veggies, even if it’s a couple tablespoons worth, I throw them in a baggie and freeze them. I pull it out and use it for soup or tator tot casserole.
I put the veggies in the pot then deboned and cut up meat and added that too. I dug through the cupboard thinking I had barley but couldn’t find any so I found some small star noodles and added 1 cup of them. I added water so it was just below the the “Max level” as seen in the picture below.  I set the Instant Pot for 6 minutes and did quick release.
I opened the pot and this is what I saw…oh my YUM!
I added salt and pepper to taste…The soup was wonderful.
Hubby is not a soup guy so to sneak it into meals, I make my soup really hearty. He’ll tolerate stew so I make my soups with minimal liquid and maximum veggies, meats and noodles.
Of course I happened to pick the chipped bowl….oh well, I keep in real here…No special photo ops here!!
So that was our AMAZING Vegetable Beef soup. YUM. I’m so glad I made enough for leftovers. I’m kind of known to do that…on Fridays I cook a little extra so on the weekend we can have leftovers for one of the meals…and as long as the leftovers are good, like this soup, no one minds leftovers!!
Jo that ,looks so yummy. I love the way you utilize the leftover veggies and come up with a wonderful stew.
Thanks for the tip about the ice cubes. I had never heard of that before. But what is an Instant Pot? I’ve never heard of that either.
Mom brought me her insta-pot, I need to actually use it. I am not sure why I am nervous or scared about trying something in it.
Thank you for the ice cube trick. I HATE skimming fat off the top of broth. I will definitely start using this trick.
Aw your fat reduction trick sounds marvelous. Making soup today and will use ice cubes. Thanks!