Recipe #5 - CHRISTmas Hambone 15 Bean Soup

Ingredients:

Beans
4 c water
4 c chicken broth
1 white onion chopped
5 carrots sliced
3 celery stalks sliced
3 garlic cloves minced
1 bay leaf
7 or 8 black peppercorns
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme seasoning
hambone thawed
6 small yellow potatoes diced
several slices of thick cut ham diced up


I began by soaking the 15 beans in water over night. I used Hurst's Hambeens collection (Northern, Pinto, Large Lima, Yelloweye Bean, Garbanzo, Baby Lima, Green Split Pea, Kidney, Cranberry Bean, Small White, Pink Bean, Small Red, Yellow Split Pea, Lentil, Navy, White Kidney, Black Bean; and only half of the bag for this batch) and discarded the sodium-laden 'ham seasoning' packet. The beans were in about 4 cups of water, and so I added probably 4 more cups of reduced sodium chicken broth to the slow cooker with the beans and the water.

To this, I added the bone, vegetables and seasoning and let it go on High for about 4 hours.
I pulled out a couple of ladles of beans/veggies and pulsed them in the processor, to give the soup some body, then let it go another 4 hours.
At this time I added the potatoes and sliced ham.
In less than an hour the potatoes were softened, so I removed the bay leaf and peppercorns (tough, very tough) and had a bowl or three.

Pretty darn good, with no added salt (ham has enough of its own), and some home-made french bread for dunking.