Bean and Ham Soup

For the longest time, I would walk by the bags of dried beans in the grocery store, wondering what it would be like to cook with them.  It's only been within the last year and a half that I conquered my fear of "real rice," and since the real rice is located right next to the dried beans, they've become next on the list of items to conquer.

Once I found an excuse to buy a bag of beans, I was then introduced to another decision-- the "quick-soak method" or the "overnight soak method."  In my soul, I have always felt that good things are worth waiting for; as a result, I chose to let the beans soak for 8 hours during the day.  (It's been my experience that whenever I choose to do a "quick method" of anything, it ends up being a bad decision.) Being that it was a snow day, it gave me something productive to do while I watched the snow plows do their work. It also gave me good excuse to keep peeking in the kitchen to see if the beans were doing anything in that big bowl of water.  I felt like a kid waiting for sea-monkeys to hatch!

Save yourself the suspense-- they don't do a whole lot :)

This soup made the house smell fantastic, and I'm anxious to share it with family members-- because like so many of my recent recipes, this made enough to feed a small army!

Ingredients:

2 carrots, sliced
2 celery stalks, chopped
1/2 c. onion, chopped
1/2 tsp. minced garlic
2 T. butter
12 c. water (Yes, this is a lot of water, but don't be alarmed-- it will boil down and thicken considerably)
1 ham hock
1 lb. dried Great Northern beans, presoaked and rinsed
1 tsp. mustard powder
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. pepper
2 bay leaves
2 c. chopped ham (I used a one-pound package of the pre-cooked, cubed ham)

Directions:

1. Saute carrots, celery, onion, and garlic in a soup pot till onion is clear (I used my trusty cast-iron Dutch oven)

2.  Add water, beans, mustard powder, salt, pepper, bay leaves, and ham hock.  Bring to a boil.

3.  Reduce heat and simmer for 60 minutes. (I did not cover the pot, because I wanted it to boil down a bit.  Next time, I might cover it for part of the cooking time, just to see how it affects the consistency.)

4.  Remove bone, add chopped ham.  Simmer another 30 minutes.

Verdict: Keeper
I want to see what other cubed/chopped ham options are available to me, because that was the one aspect I felt lacked a little flavor.