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The gray, chilly days of Northern Indiana November always make me hungry for soup, and I make several kinds and freeze some for when there’s a lot of snow on the ground. Senate Restaurant Bean Soup is one of my favorites. It is easy and filling, and it’s inexpensive and good for you, too!
This recipe comes from a 1976 Junior League of Grand Rapids, Michigan cookbook, and I’ve adapted it a bit over the years. For example, the original recipe calls for navy beans, which are much less interesting and flavorful. Bean soup is on the menu in the Senate’s restaurant every day. There are several stories about the origin of that mandate, but none has been corroborated. The recipes found online usually omit some of the ingredients in my recipe.
Ingredients
1 package of 15-bean soup beans; discard the flavoring packet, if there is one
2 large yellow onions, chopped
1 or 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
3 Tbsp. butter or margarine
1 smoked ham hock shank (or any very meaty ham bone)
2 bay leaves
1 carrot, peeled and chopped
1/2 lemon
6 stems parsley
3/4 tsp. dried thyme
Assembly
Soak beans overnight, then drain and rinse them well under hot water. Lightly brown the onion and garlic in butter. Put beans, 3 qts. water, and all of the other ingredients into a large pot or dutch oven (a slow cooker would work too). Cook covered, slowly, at least 3 hours or until the liquid is reduced by half. Remove and discard the bay leaves, the 1/2 lemon, and what’s left of the parsley stems. Remove 2 cups of beans with a little liquid, puree them in a blender, and return the puree to the soup to thicken it. Remove the ham bone from the pot, remove the meat, cut it into small pieces and return it to the soup. Season with freshly ground pepper and 1 Tbsp. salt. Serve with cornbread and a tossed salad. Makes about 8 servings. It can be gently reheated, and freezes well.
Enjoy!
11 Comments
yum!
That’s it…I’m doing a crock pot version of this for tomorrow night. Tasty.
Thanks, MsMolly — it’s the bay leaves and time which add the much-needed definition to this soup. I make one which is very similar to this; it’s always popular. I usually add some chicken broth and a couple of boiled, cubed waxy potatoes along with (8) oz. of finely cubed sauted ham. It adds a little more texture.
I have not done it in the crock pot, but I don’t see why you couldn’t. Maybe when I made it last I didn’t have my 5 qt. crock pot, and it’s too much, especially with a good sized ham bone, to make in my small one.
I’ve only found one almost identical recipe online. The others all leave out the last several ingredients. And none of them call for the 15-bean package of beans — that’s my own invention and it adds so much more interest to the soup. There are some really interesting looking beans in the mixture.
That’s odd….my reply to this comment disappeared. I don’t see why you couldn’t use low sodium chicken broth in place of some or all of the water, for still more flavorful soup. I always make sure to get a ham bone with lots of meat on it.
Yeah, I agree, a ham bone is best. Smoked picnic, too. I always throw my hame/smoked picnic bones in crockpot and stew them down, pick off the meat and freeze the broth and meat for soup in a jiffy.
Shhh…don’t tell, but in a hurry I take a quart of this frozen broth/meat, a BIG jar of Randall’s Great Northern beans drained, sauted carrots/celery/onions/garlic, couple boiled/cubed waxy potatoes and the bay leaves/thyme, put them together and PRESTO! soup in about 20 minutes. If it’s too think, low sodium chicken broth works great.
I will have to try that sometime. I almost never have a ham bone unless I buy it specifically for this soup. I live alone, and ham with a bone in it is far too much meat for one person.
My mother would put a ham hock in her soup. She used an eight-quart kettle.
(The funniest thing that ever happened was the time the cat licked the soup bowl clean. We didn’t think cats would like bean soup.)
Oh, there probably was a lot for a cat to like in there, mainly the ham flavor.
Great recipe MSmolly, thanks!
I love the 15 bean idea, that’s a keeper.
Chicken stock for sure . . . or, ham paste/base if it’s the kind of thing one has in your kitchen . . .
Some salt pork or even bacon in there early with onions and garlic (I’d have to triple your onion and garlic amounts for my taste, I’m a FIEND for both!).
It’s definitely soup time.
BTW, my folks were from Terra Haute . . . I was there 3 times in the 50′s as a child on home leave from SE Asia . . . . I recall lots of red brick in schools and in houess . . . and lots of wild farm land around farm houses with berry bushes galore . . .
The original recipe calls for 4 large onions, but I’ve cut it back to two and that seems to be enough and just about all I have the patience to chop. The original also calls for a clove of garlic, and I routinely use two large ones.
My son-in-law works at a bank in Terre Haute and commutes from his northeast Indianapolis suburb every day — 2 hours each way. I’ve never been to Terre Haute.