White Bean Soup

This is one of those dishes that I wanted to make, didn't really read the recipe first and assumed I had what I needed in the pantry. As usual, didn't exactly work out that way but I still made a really good soup. I told Bob last night I probably would have eaten the whole pot if I wasn't full and they didn't need to eat still. The base recipe came from my Joy of Cooking cookbook, Mediterranean White Bean Soup. It calls for large dried white beans, like great Northern or cannelini but I only had Navy beans; they worked fine but large ones would have been better. This was really easy to make, even starting with dried beans.

White Bean Soup

1 c dried white beans
7 c water
3/4 tsp dried rosemary
8 cloves garlic, chopped or sliced
1 can diced tomatoes
1/4 c olive oil
4 tsp red wine vinegar
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground pepper

Pick over, rinse, and soak the beans.* After the beans are drained, put in a soup pot along with the water, rosemary, and garlic. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer until the beans are tender, about 1 to 1.5 hours. Stir in the undrained diced tomatoes and the rest of the ingredients. Serve with crackers or crusty bread.



*I used the quick soak method - cover the beans with water by 2 inches in a pot, bring to a boil, turn off the heat, cover, and let sit for an hour or until doubled in size; drain, discarding the soaking water. The other way you can do it is to put them in a pot, cover by 2 inches with water, cover, and let soak overnight. I usually never plan far enough ahead to do this.