Harvesting

15 Bean Soup, Chilies and Chives

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Cajun 15-Bean Soup with Smoked Sausage - Beans
Image by I Believe I Can Fry via Flickr

Chilly weather makes soup inviting. In the never-ending quest to find something good to eat, I picked up a package of Hurst’s Hambeens Brand 15 Bean Soup. Twenty ounces of the most colorful collection of dried beans you’ve ever seen.

The bean soup recipe from the package –

  • one pound of ham or sausage
  • 1 cup onion, diced
  • 1 15 oz. can stewed or diced tomatoes
  • 1 tsp chili powder
  • juice of one lemon
  • 1-2 cloves garlic, minced

Soak the beans in 2 qt. water in a large pot overnight. Drain liquid and rinse beans twice. Put on high heat, stirring occasionally until boiling. The directions say to simmer, uncovered for 2 and a half hours, but that wasn’t long enough. It took several hours and some more cooking the next day to get the larger beans soft enough that they didn’t crunch a little. The package states –

Depending on water hardness, cooking time may need to be increased.

Well, I guess we have some really hard water! Anyway, the bean soup turned out great, even if it did take hours to make.

I added a small amount of chopped ham, about half a pound, a can of stewed tomatoes, a cup of diced red onion, 1 tsp chili powder, 1 T lemon concentrate, 2 cloves garlic, and 3 crushed, dried chili peppers seeds and all to the pot before the beans were thoroughly cooked. The added ingredients were cooked so long I thought the soup would have no flavor, but I was wrong. I didn’t add the “flavor packet” that comes with the beans. Only a sprinkle of salt was needed at the table, none was added in cooking apart from that added by the ham.

The next time I think I would cook the beans harder during the initial hour or two of “simmering” time, but realize that using beans of different sizes means that some will take longer to cook.

 

15 Bean Soup with a dollop of sour cream and cut chives
15 Bean Soup with a dollop of sour cream and cut chives

To dress it up a bit, I went to the garden and snipped a couple of chives leaves for each serving and cut them into small pieces. Added a dollop of sour cream and sprinkled the whole bowl of bean soup with fresh-cut chives. Enjoy!

Onion Snow, Potato, Egg and Chives

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It’s about time for the landscape to turn green as we’re already a couple weeks into Spring. The light snow that has fallen during the night for the last few days would have you thinking otherwise. Good thing the snow won’t last because we’re very ready to start gardening with our herbs.

Lettuce, peas and onion sets are already planted in the garden. Last night’s snow would be called an “Onion Snow” because it covered over the onions that were planted a week ago. The ground is still cold, but when it warms up the onions will start growing quickly.

Onion sets in the garden with a little snow on top.
Onion sets in the garden with a little snow on top. Photos taken 1APR2011.

Onions that were water-logged last year and whose tops died back have sprouted. I was surprised that any root remained for re-growth, but the greenery is already 4-6 inches tall.

Garlic and chives are re-growing and soon they’ll be on the dinner table. You could as easily call this a “Chives Snow” instead of an Onion Snow. The wild chives that we see growing in the woods are the only green thing growing under the trees right now, except for a rare fern here and there starting to green up.

Perennial chives under the April Fool's Snow.
Perennial chives under the April Fool’s Snow.

I think I’ll snip off some chives for a potato and egg dish tonight. Here’s a quick recipe for Potato, Egg and Chives:

  • Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a skillet and add half an onion, diced.
  • Cook the onions until soft.
  • Add a couple of cubed potatoes, cover and steam until cooked through.
  • Beat a couple of eggs in a separate dish or add them directly into the skillet.
  • Cover for one minute and then flip the whole mess for another minute or just stir everything together.
  • When the eggs are set, sprinkle with pepper and cut chives.
  • Serve with toast. Yum!
Twenty-two Canada Geese flying North.
Twenty-two Canada Geese flying North.

The Canada Geese I heard overhead this morning were flying due North and that was a happy sight!