I’d venture to guess that peas are a vegetable most people never eat fresh.  I think it’s the convenience factor — frozen and canned peas are easy and inexpensive — and the fact that frozen can sometimes taste even better than fresh, because they’re picked at the height of sweetness before the peas turn starchy.

This spring weather has me searching for all kinds of recipes using peas. Nothing jumped out until I found this recipe in my Lidia Bastianich cookbook for Risi e Bisi — rice and spring pea soup. Lidia says it’s a typical spring soup of the Veneto region of Italy.

Here it is:

2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp unsalted butter
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 cups fresh shelled peas, or 10-ounce box frozen peas
1/2 cup celery, chopped
8 cups reduced-sodium chicken stock
1 cup Arborio rice
Parmesan cheese for grating

Heat the olive oil and butter (I used 1/2 tbsp) over medium heat and cook the onion until soft. Then add the garlic, stir in the peas and celery, and cook for a few minutes.  Season with fresh black pepper (and salt if necessary, but I don’t think you’ll need it.)

Add the stock and bring to a boil.  Then simmer for 20 minutes.

Add the rice and cook until tender, stirring occasionally.  My rice took about 15 minutes before it was tender but still had a nice bite.

Remove from heat and grate the Parmesan to taste.

The soup surprised me because it doesn’t require many ingredients, but has a ton of flavor — unlike the vegetable stews I made recently that used twice the ingredients but were flat and bland.  And it’s light enough to be a spring meal before the temps get too warm.

So break out those bags of frozen peas and enjoy!