Hajar's Best Moroccan Chorba

With cold weather and Ramadan approaching this soup along with Morocco's national soup Harira will be daily staples here. Morocco is known for wonderful soups IF you use the authentic home cook's recipes!

• Ready In: 1 hr 55 mins
• Serves: 6

Ingredients

• 250  g  calf meat or 250  g beef or 250  g chicken
• 2  carrots
• 2  turnips
• 2  large potatoes
• 2  stalks celery
• 3  very ripe tomatoes or 2  tablespoons  tomato concentrate or 2  tablespoons tomato puree
• 1  bunch  fresh flat leaf parsley
• 1  onion
• 2  cups  vermicelli or 2  cups  thin spaghetti, broken into 1/4-inch pieces
• 1  tablespoon  oil
• 2  teaspoons fresh ground black pepper
• 1⁄8 teaspoon saffron (optional)
• 1  teaspoon  good turmeric

Directions

1. If you cannot find turnips use kholrabi or other similar firm vegetable, even cabbage in chunks! You can also simply omit it. We use what we have not necessarily what we need here in Morocco. Just do not use rutabegas/swede! Most of we Moroccan home cooks use the 1 teaspoons of good turmeric instead of the saffron but you must use one or the other as this is mainly for color.
2. Peel and cut the vegetables into little pieces(except for tomatoes), put them inside a stew pot ,add the meat cut in little pieces plus the vegetables with parsley,crushed onion (grated or very finely minced),oil salt, pepper and saffron. Add 2 ltres of water, put the pot on until boiling.
3. Fold the parsley into a bundle/packet and tie with a stem or kitchen string.
4. Remove the tomato cores, wash them and plunge them for 30 seconds into boiling water before peeling them, crush the pulp with a fork in a bowl or on a plate, put the tomatoes in the pot and mix. Cover and leave it cook on a medium fire for 60 minutes.
5. 10 minutes before serving, throw vermecilli in rain (scatter) , cover 3/4 and leave it to cook. Serve as soon as it is cooked. Pasta is done. Please do not cook your Moroccan dishes with pasta al dente; al just isn't to be found. We think that he left for America! Also, here someone always eats the parsley bundle.