Christmas Tortellini Soup

Second week of Advent. I have been thinking about fifty. About what it means to be a woman who has lived for half a century, which sounds like a long time when you say it out loud and a short time when you think about what remains to be done. Bernice at fifty was in the middle of her life—she cooked for another thirty years after fifty, she buried Willie James at ninety-nine and almost made it there herself. At fifty I am in the middle of my life if I am lucky and in the later portion of it if I am not, and I don't know which one I am, and I have decided that the not-knowing is not a problem. What I do with whatever there is: that's the project. The project doesn't require a timeline.

I have been thinking about what I want for this birthday. Not in the gift sense—I am fifty years old, I do not need things—but in the what-does-this-birthday-mean sense, the meaning-making that Bernice always did around birthdays, the way she would say, at each of her own, "Another year of grace." Not "another year survived" or "another year accomplished"—another year of grace, as if each year were a gift given freely, unearned, not a right but a privilege. I want that framing. Another year of grace. Fifty years of grace, some of them full of light and some of them dark and all of them given.

The cooking class had thirteen students on Saturday. We made yeast rolls for Advent—the soft white kind, the pull-apart kind, the kind that require two rises and come out of the pan in a cluster like a small family, each roll touching the others, supporting the others, rising together. Thirteen women in a church kitchen on a December Saturday, making rolls that would be eaten on Sunday. I looked at them and thought: this is the most normal and extraordinary thing I do. This. Right here.

The rolls we made that Saturday were not mine to keep — they went to Sunday tables, eaten by people I may never know — but the feeling of them stayed with me, the warmth of a shared kitchen, the way something simple becomes extraordinary when thirteen pairs of hands are in it together. This Christmas Tortellini Soup is the recipe I come back to when I want that same feeling at home: one pot, honest ingredients, the kind of thing you can make on a weeknight in Advent when the dark comes early and you need something that tastes like it was made with intention. It rises to the occasion the way those women rose to theirs — quietly, fully, without any fuss.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 20 minutes | Total Time: 30 minutes | Servings: 6

Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 medium carrots, sliced into rounds
2 stalks celery, sliced
1/2 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
6 cups low-sodium chicken or vegetable broth
1 (14.5 oz) can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 (9 oz) package refrigerated cheese tortellini
2 cups fresh baby spinach
Salt and black pepper to taste
Freshly grated Parmesan, for serving

Instructions

Sauté the aromatics. Heat olive oil in a large pot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onion, carrots, and celery and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 to 6 minutes. Add the garlic, Italian seasoning, and red pepper flakes and cook for 1 minute more until fragrant.
Build the broth. Pour in the chicken broth and diced tomatoes with their juices. Raise the heat to medium-high and bring to a gentle boil.
Cook the tortellini. Add the cheese tortellini and cook according to package directions, usually 5 to 7 minutes, until tender and cooked through.
Finish with greens. Stir in the baby spinach and cook for 1 to 2 minutes until wilted. Taste and season with salt and black pepper as needed.
Serve. Ladle into bowls and top with freshly grated Parmesan. Serve with crusty bread if you have it.

Nutrition (per serving)

Christmas Tortellini Soup — What We Make When We Make Something Together