When your schedule has less room on it than the Tokyo subway at rush hour, a bowl of canned soup is a good, quick and easy meal option. But there's one thing that's not so easy about it: Finding the veggies in there.
Here's how to make it easy again, Soup up your soup with fennel. A spice, herb and veggie all rolled into one, fennel complements many soups, from chicken noodle to tomato. And it's loaded with disease stomping flavonoids.
This aromatic, versatile powerhouse knocks food borne bacteria out flat. Which ones? E. coli, Salmonella and certain strains of Staphylococcus that may be hanging out in other food you touch, eat or add to your soup.
Look for fennel, a wholly edible root vegetable, in the produce section, It looks like a bulb with feathered leaves and celerylike stalks. Just chop it and toss some in your bowl before you nuke your soup.
Make the most of your quickie meal by checking that you're having a good soup to begin with. It should contain less than 400 milligrams of sodium (that's how they label salt) per serving. Avoid soups with noodles, since they may be cooked in saturated or trans fats.
If you're having a salad with your soup, spice it up with fennel, too. You don't even need lettuce, Just serve thinly sliced fennel with oranges and toasted nuts.
