Ronald Reagan's Hamburger Soup

Directions

1. Step 1: Brown meat in butter in six-qt sauce pan. Add in onions, garlic, carrots, celery and green pepper. Simmer 10 min with the pan covered.
2. Step 2: Add in beef broth or possibly water with bouillon cubes. Add in minced tomato and pepper. Simmer soup on low heat for 35 min. Add in hominy. Boil hamburger soup for 10 min more.
3. Makes 4 qts.
4. Comments: There's been speculation which this first made news after President Reagan innocently announced his liking for fancy French soups...and was immediately accused of being elitist. Whatever. It's definitely a homespun, plain soup, and not as bad as you might think when you see which there's hominy in it. This corn product - with an Algonquin Native American name - was an important food to early U.S. pioneers. It's a nice hard little ball in the soup - almost dumpling like. Serve the soup as a lunch meal to 4 to 6 people with lots of cornbread, cool lowfat milk, and maybe a big American pie for dessert. Above is the recipe verbatim (as sent out over the PR Newswire, March 11, 1986) - note the non-elitist allowance for canned foods and bouillon cubes.
5. Yield: 4 qts