Receipe Box! Vegetable-Beef soup

We eat a lot of soup in our family and this is one of Dean's favorites.  If he is sick, he asks for it. It is a three step process but takes little time and is super easy.  I can even make this on a night after work.

This soup didn't actually have a recipe.  My mom just threw stuff together.  
One day, I jotted it all down as she went.   I was about 13 years old at the time so my directions were horrid and I'm sure I left stuff out.  Doesn't matter, it is comfort food in a bowl and so good.  Not highly seasoned, this isn't gumbo y'all!  Make sure to have a good loaf of bread to sop up all the goodness the spoon can't reach!  

Mumu's old fashioned vegetable beef soup*

2 pounds stew meat
1 large can WHOLE tomatoes, squished.  
1 quart water with beef boullion cubes (you may need to add more water later)
1 large onion-WHOLE

Put the above ingredients into a large stock pot.  Cover, bring to a boil and then turn  down to medium.   Let it simmer for 1 hour.  After an hour, carefully remove the whole onion.  Squish it a bit to get the juices out.

After an hour, add:

1 can lima beans
1 can shoepeg (white nibblet) corn
2 potatoes, diced
1 onion, diced
2 celery stalks, diced
2-3 carrots, diced (I use frozen carrots to save prep time)  We like a LOT of carrots.  

Simmer until carrots and potatoes are almost tender. The last 10 minutes, toss in a handful of broken spaghetti.  continue cooking until the pasta is done.

Taste test for salt and pepper, serve!

Modifications:

*The original recipe calls for cubed arm roast but use stew meat because it takes less prep time.  *You can use a large can of diced tomatoes instead.  
*You can sub beef stock/broth if you want.  Might change the flavor a bit...don't know, never tried it!
*Some folks in my family don't want the pasta so I use a cup of ditalini pasta and cook it separately.  That way, people can just add it to their own bowls.
*Remember that if you add more veggies, you need to compensate with more liquid.