Ham & Bean Soup

Gaseous Diffusion Reactor



Beans, beans, they're good for the heart...

Winter arrived in East Tennessee with a vengeance this week. Daytime temperatures haven't been that bad -- low 50s and high 40s. But it's been dropping into the 20s at night. Good sleeping weather. And good soup weather too.

I thought about making a ham and barley soup I came up with last winter, but, as I've mentioned before, I've been trying to learn to like beans, so I decided to try making bean soup. But not just any bean soup. I wanted to pack as much flavor and savor into it as I possibly could. I wanted the beans literally bursting with goodness and I started by making stock from a smoked ham hock. Long, slow simmering on the stove wrested most of the flavor from the hock and aromatics.

Then I cooked the beans from dry to tender in the stock so they'd absorb as much of the savor as their desiccated little bodies could hold. Additional aromatics and pieces of country ham added to the cooking liquid took the soup right over the top. But it was worth it. One bowl of this stuff and you're ready dig ditches in permafrost. And the lower intestinal effects were rather over the top as well.

Bean Soup

1 ea smoked ham hock
1 ea onion -- quartered
1 stalk celery -- 3" pieces
1 ea lg carrot -- 3" pieces
2 ea bay leaves
1 lb navy beans -- picked over
1/2 lb country ham -- fat trimmed off
1 ea onion -- diced
1 stalk celery -- sliced into 1/4" thick rounds
1 ea lg carrot -- sliced into 1/4" thick rounds
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp rubbed sage
1 tbsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1 qt water -- simmering

Place ham hock, quartered onion, large pieces of carrot and celery, and bay leaves in a large soup pot. Add 5 quarts cold water and set over medium heat. Bring to a vigorous simmer (**do not boil), reduce heat to low, and cover. Cook for about three hours. Cool.

Pour stock through a strainer into a large bowl. Discard vegetables. Cut up meat from ham hock into small pieces and add to stock. Cover and cool to room temperature or overnight in refrigerator.

Heat oven to 300F. Put beans in oven-proof soup pot and add all remaining ingredients except water. Place pot over medium heat and bring to a vigorous simmer (**do not boil). Cover and place on a lower, but not the lowest, oven rack. Cook for about four hours, checking every hour and adding enough additional hot water to keep beans well covered.

Remove from oven, adjust seasonings and amount of water. Serve with hot sauce on the side. Serves 6.

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