Stormy Day Bean Soup

Whilst we await my beautious basement makeover, allow me to delight you with a delish winter soup recipe. I LOVE homemade soups and stews during our cold, Maine winters! So cozy and warm while they cook on top of the stove all day filling the house with yummy smells - overpowering the smells of concrete, cement, and dust.

Ahem.

So, this soup works great after you have your Christmas or Easter ham - or whenever you might have a ham bone with a little bit of meat on it left over from a previous meal.

This is an Old Timer's soup - my Grammy used to make this, and my Mom always makes it in the winter. So, it comes with cozy memories for me. We had ourselves a delish spiral ham for supper up home, and Mom let me take the hambone home to make this soup with.

That sounded funny. Yay! I get to have the hambone! Whoohoo!!

Anyway....here it is. No real recipe, I guess. It's kind of a chuck 'er all in the pot kind of a soup. My fave.

SO. Take your hambone with all of the meat that's still on it - you don't really need a lot - and (after taking any skin or fat off of it) put it in a huge pot and completely cover it with water. Add a couple of pounds of beans - yellow eye or soldier - and cook that baby for hours....until the beans are soft.

Take the ham bone out and use a potato masher to mash the stuffing out of the beans.
Pick the ham off the bone.
Add 4 or 5 onions, a couple of stalks of celery, some really finely chopped carrot for color, and 5 or 6 potatoes to make the soup thick. ALL chopped really really finely.
Put the bone back in to get all of the yummy goodness and flavor out of it.
When it's at the thickness you want - add salt and pepper to taste, and serve with your most favorite roll recipe.

I'll admit - it looks a wee bit like cat vomit, but if you can get over that....it's all good.


(Ransom sharing carrots with Tucker. Mmm).

Make a honking soup, so you can bottle up a few quarts for your neighbors.
And perhaps serve with a large dose of bean-o.
Just sayin'.