Snapshot: Soup's on

pioneer woman's tortellini soup

I worked my first church potluck soup dinner this past Friday. The different groups of the church take a Friday of Lent and this week was the garden group...which we have belonged to going on three years.
I made The Pioneer Woman's tortellini soup and a peanut butter pie.
I only have a few rules for making food for other people:
1) Is it easy with relatively few ingredients that can be found at a common grocery store?
2) Do the ingredients sound good?
3) Have I made it at least once, succeeded and enjoyed it?

That's all it really takes.
My kids like this tortellini soup, therefore it's gold in my book.

When I got to the hall, they had long tables set up with power strips and extension cords. There were about 20 crock pots of soups lined up and ready to go. I was assigned to serve my own soup and was put next to a woman I knew from many Saturdays in the garden together. Let's call her Denise (as in "You were at my wedding, Denise..."). She's a friendly lady, very nice and sort of bossy. She knows best and she small talks like a champ.
It became very clear to me that Denise had quite the reputation with the old ladies at church for being a great cook. The little old ladies were walking by saying things like, "Oh, I'm definitely coming for your soup, I know it will be good!" She was beaming.
When people started coming through the line, I was initially being skipped so that they could get a ladle of Denise's broccoli cheddar soup.
All it took, though, was one little old lady to give the Pioneer Woman a try.

She came back shortly and exclaimed that she needed the recipe because it was soooooooooo good!
Suddenly, Denise became a little more interested in who I was; I was now on her radar.
"What is your name?" she asked.
Now look. We've met countless times. And I'm sorry, I do not have a forgettable face in a sea of white.
She knew who I was. I'm the one constantly chasing the one-year-old that no one can tell if it's a boy or a girl.
But I reintroduced myself. Again.
She stuck a spoon in my crock pot (literally...no euphemisms). She tasted the broth and did a very emphatic "Yuuuummmmmm" like I was a toddler who just gave her a plastic cookie. "I just HAVE to have the recipe!"
I told her it was pretty easy...so easy that I could tell her all the ingredients off the top of my head. Also, it's online. For anyone. She wrote it all down and said she cooks regularly for elderly people. She usually makes everything from scratch...so this would be a great recipe to make when she needed something quick. It would give her a break from all of her from scratch cooking.

Little by little, other old ladies from the club filtered by to get some of the soup that was now being raved about among the patrons (mine, in case you didn't pick up on that...).
And then it was gone.
First emptied crock pot...#first. #blessed

"Well, I guess I'll go sit down and eat since my soup is gone," I said as NOT smugly as I could. "I'll see you ladies at clean up..." (even though my dishes have both been cleaned up for me...BOOM).

Did I mention this was at church?
Forgive me Father, for I have sinned.