Classic Ham and Bean Soup

When Life Gives You… Make Delicious Soup!

It’s April 15, 2020, and we’ve been over a month now in our Stay-at-Home – Covid-19 Situation. I am grateful that we are all well and we have food to eat.

I’ve been trying to keep our grocery shopping trips to a minimum, so it’s been a bit of a game, especially at dinner time, figuring out what we can make.

Easter this year was a little different too – our usual party of 30 with a giant bone-in ham was pared down to a party of 4. We did video chat with our cousins while eating, this is apparently called at “Virtual Dinner Party.” For our dinner, we had the smallest ham I could find, it was boneless and pre-sliced.

We’re not huge ham eaters, but we do enjoy a few traditional slices as part of our Easter celebration. After the celebration, I like to make ham and bean soup – here’s how I made it this year, with our leftover boneless ham slices. I’ll try to give lots of notes and options in case you need to make some substitutions too.

Spinach & Basil Pesto:

I love to top my soup with a spoonful of this tasty pesto!

Perfect Picture for Pinterest: ⬇️

Classic Ham and Bean Soup

To give this soup a nice silky texture, I partially puree some of the tender beans and vegetables. I love to top this warm and comforting soup with a spoonful of my Spinach and Basil Pesto! It melts into the savory soup and is so tasty!

Tina Verrelli - epicuricloud.com

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Course: Soup

Keyword: beans, ham, Soup

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 3 hours

Total Time: 3 hours 20 minutes

Servings: 4 servings

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons oil
• 1 cup finely chopped onion
• 1 cup finely chopped carrot
• 1 cup finely chopped celery
• 1 large bay leaf
• 3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
• ham bone or left-over ham see note
• 1 1/2 cups dried great northern beans see note
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 sprig fresh rosemary see note
• 3 sprigs fresh thyme see note
• 8 cups water
• 1 2-inch piece Parmesan cheese rind optional
• 1 cup finely diced ham reserve until end of recipe
• salt to taste

Instructions 

• Heat large pot (6 quart) over medium heat. Add oil, onion, carrot, celery, bay leaf and garlic. Saute for about 7 minutes or until softened.
• Add ham (bone or leftover slices), beans, black pepper, rosemary and thyme sprigs (tie together with kitchen string, if you have it.) Pour water over top. Add 2-inch piece of Parmesan cheese rind (optional.)
• Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer covered for 3-4 hours or until the beans are tender.
• Remove ham/ham bone, rosemary, thyme stems and Parmesan rind. Use an immersion blender or regular blender to puree part of the soup. (If you don't have one, you can remove some beans to a bowl and mash them, then put them back in the soup.) Stir in the reserved diced ham and allow the soup to simmer for a few minutes uncovered to thicken.
• You can taste and add salt if needed. If your soup gets too thick, you can thin with a little water. I like to serve mine with a spoonful of my Spinach and Basil Pesto.

Notes

Ham:

I usually make my ham soup with a ham bone.  This time I didn't have one, so I used about 1 1/2 pounds of the boneless sliced ham we had leftover.  I rinsed off some of the mustard and brown sugar glaze that was on the ham.  Once that ham is cooked for hours in the pot, it's pretty well spent and falls apart.  I like to discard or use that for a casserole or something.  I like to reserve some additional diced ham to add to the soup at the end.

Beans:

I happened to have half bag of dried Great Northern Beans leftover in my pantry - so that is what I used.  It was 1 1/2 cups dried.  [I have used a whole pound of beans as well (approx. 2 1/4 cups) and just adjusted the water toward the end of cooking to thin out a little.]  I did not soak them ahead of time.  You can soak them if you want, it will help reduce the cook time.  You can use canned beans (drained and rinsed) as well, but you may want to add them after the ham has simmered for at least an hour to make the broth flavorful.  Sometimes if you cook canned beans for too long, they tend to fall apart.

Herbs:

Use what herbs you have dried or fresh.  Thyme, rosemary, parsley would all work well, I'd start with 2 teaspoons each for the fresh herbs.  Dried Italian Seasoning  would be nice, I'd start with 1 teaspoon for any dried herbs.  If you have kitchen string, you can tie together a little bundle of your fresh thyme and rosemary sprigs and pull them out later.  Otherwise you'll need to take the leaves off the sprigs.  

Parmesan Cheese Rind:

If you buy wedges of Parmesan cheese the rind can be used as a flavoring in soups and stews.  You can also cut the rind into about 2-inch pieces and freeze them for when you're ready to make a soup or stew.  Make sure to only use the outermost part of the rind.  If there's a lot of cheese left, it can get stringy and stick to the bottom of your pot.  If you don't have it, no worries, your soup will still be plenty tasty!.

Nutrition (approx. data estimated via online nutritional calculator.)

Calories: 363kcal (18%) | Carbohydrates: 52g (17%) | Protein: 21g (42%) | Fat: 9g (14%) | Saturated Fat: 1g (6%) | Cholesterol: 15mg (5%) | Sodium: 449mg (20%) | Potassium: 1187mg (34%) | Fiber: 16g (67%) | Sugar: 6g (7%) | Vitamin A: 5495IU (110%) | Vitamin C: 11mg (13%) | Calcium: 171mg (17%) | Iron: 4mg (22%)

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