Vegan Black Bean Pasta e Fagioli (Pasta Fazul)

  Happy Meatless Monday! Tonight I made a recipe adapted from Nadia G's Bitchin' Kitchen. Her recipe included bacon, chicken stock, wheat pasta, and parmesean, which I excluded or substituted to fit our allergies and monday meatless-ness. I also exchanged the white beans for garbonzo and black beans plus a few other adjustments. This was a big hit with everyone in the family!
  By the way, nutritional yeast flakes are cheesy, salty flavored flakes (sorta look like fish food) that can be used like you would use parmesean, or sprinkled on popcorn, or used to make "cheese" sauces, etc. I recommend you get yourself a container of it! I get mine off of Amazon.com.
Anyway, without further ado, here is the recipe!

Vegan Black Bean Pasta e Fagioli 

2 cloves garlic, minced
1 red onion, chopped
1 rib celery, chopped
2 carrots, thinly sliced
1 Tbl olive oil
1/2 cup halved cherry tomatoes (or 1 can drained stewed tomatoes)
1 can garbonzo beans, mostly drained
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
4 cups vegetable stock (soy, wheat, dairy free)
1 tsp oregeno
1/2 tsp rosemary
1 pinch brown sugar
2 tsp sea salt
black pepper to taste
1/4 tsp cayenne (optional)
nutritional yeast flakes (optional)
3/4 lb corn pasta elbows

  In a large saucepan, heat olive oil over medium high heat and fry garlic for about 1 minute. Add vegetables and saute until onion begins to turn translucent and lose it's bright purple color. Add the vegetable stock and tomatoes, bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer.
  In a food processor, puree garbonzo beans (drained except for about 2 tsp of liquid from the can) until fairly smooth, about hummus texture. Add the pureed beans to the stock/veggie mixture and stir well. Add oregeno, brown sugar, rosemary, pepper, salt, and cayenne if using. Simmer 30 minutes.
  In the meantime, boil pasta in a seperate pot as per package directions until al dente. You could cook the noodles in the stock, but non wheat pastas have a tendency to turn to mush very quickly, so I recommend you keep them seperate to have some control.
 After the stock has simmered 30 minutes, add the black beans and allow to heat through (about 5 minutes). Mix pasta and soup together in bowls, sprinkle with a pinch of nutritional yeast flakes, and enjoy!
Serves 4