This recipe came about one evening when Rob was in the mood for soup and I wanted to get rid of a bunch of stuff we had in the fridge. He googled some combination of the items in our fridge with "soup" tacked onto the end, and came across a recipe that sounded decent. He adapted it, adding other stuff we had, and the result was delicious.

Driving home from somewhere not long before, we'd been flipping through the stations and came upon John Tesh talking about how to create family traditions. He claimed that just giving something an official name would make it feel to your kids like a tradition, even if you'd never done it before. He said, for example, that you could make some random casserole for the first time but calling it "Aunt Sally's Famous Tuna Casserole" would make it seem special to your kids. You all know I think John Tesh is a crock of shit, but this amused me and so when Rob made this soup the first time, I proclaimed it Rob's Famous Tortellini and Artichoke Soup. Maybe Tesh was onto something, though, because this recipe is quickly becoming a tradition as it is now on regular rotation at our house, changing slightly each time depending on what we have on hand.

Also, Rob cooks like his mom, so all of these measurements are bad estimates at best.

olive oil
1/2 chopped onion
2 tbsp. chopped garlic
4 oz ground Italian sausage
1 can broth (chicken, beef, or vegetable)
1 can diced tomatoes
1 can white beans (garbanzo, great northern, or navy)
3 artichoke hearts, chopped
2 tsp. Italian seasoning
pepper to taste
8 oz. cheese-filled tortellini, uncooked

First sauté Italian sausage, onion, and garlic in olive oil. Then add all ingredients to saucepan and boil until tortellini is cooked.

(For the crockpot: Sauté Italian sausage like above, then add all ingredients but tortellini to the crockpot and cook on Low for at least several hours. For last hour, add tortellini and cook on High.)

Makes 4 servings