Sausage Vegetable Soup

4 cups beef broth
1 can diced tomatoes with diced chilies
1 package Adelle's chicken apple sausage-around 6-8 links, sliced into 1/4 inch slices
1 can white beans- drained, rinsed
1 can red kidney beans- drained, rinsed
1 bay leaf
4 cloves of garlic- peeled and minced
2 tbsp dried parsley
1/2 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp pepper
1 cup diced carrots
1 cup diced celery
1/2 cup broccoli
2 cups diced potatoes ( I used baby reds)
1 onion- diced

Combine all ingredients in a 6-quart crock pot. Cook on low 6- 8 hours.

This recipe might be more appropriately named "Leftover Soup" because that is what it was. We were going out to our cabin for the weekend and I had a ton of vegetables in the fridge that needed to be eaten. So I brought them all out, chopped them up, added some sausage and a few other things. Viola! A fantastic soup. My kids gave this a thumbs up, even though Alex only would eat the sausage and Hailey would only eat the beans out of it. My husband absolutely loved it. So did I.

Neal's only suggestion was that I try cooking the sausage first on high heat to brown it and seal in the flavor. I'll try that next time. I usually like one step cooking- throw it all in the pot and turn it on. Sometimes a few extra steps are worth it though.