Every year on January 6, in celebration of the epiphany, my parents would have a dinner that consisted of this bean soup recipe and donuts with coins in it. The coins represented the gifts of the Magi or wise man to baby Jesus.
My family passed this bean soup recipe down through the generations. The thing I love about family recipes is that they always express the preferences of the family members. For example, my grand mom hated the dumplings so she added the potatoes instead. I believe that this recipe was originally a vegetarian soup because my mom's family lineage didn't eat pork for religious reason. Apparently, my mom add the ham to the recipe for my dad who was a real meat and potatoes guy.
Ingredients
1 lb dried navy beans
2 1/2 - 3 quarts water
1 medium onion, chopped
2 or 3 stalks celery, chopped
2 or 3 carrots, cubed
1 turnip, peeled & cubed
1 parsnip, peeled & cubed
1 14.5oz can tomatoes, diced
1/2 tsp paprika
1 Ham Bone (optional)
Dumplings (see below) or 2 - 3 potatoes, cubed
Sort & rinse beans. Put beans in soup pot and cover with water. Bring to boil, turn off and let sit about an hour. Drain beans.
Put the above ingredients into a soup pot.(Note: You can also put a ham bone in at this point)
Simmer for about 2 hours.
If you added a ham bone, remove it and let cool. Pick meat off of bone and add it to broth. Now add 1 1/2 tablespoons of salt into the soup and continue simmering for at least another hour or longer. Occasionally with spoon mash some of the beans. Note: DO NOT PUT THE SALT IN AT THE BEGINNING OF COOKING, beans may not soften if you do)
About 1/2 hours before you are ready to serve the soup, add potatoes (2 to 3 potatoes). You can also make dumplings. If you do dumplings, you do not need as many potatoes or you can eliminate the potatoes altogether.
Dumplings
1/2 cup flour
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
Water (about 2 or 3 tbsp)
Mix the above ingredients. The consistency should be a little thick, like thickened pancake batter, not runny. Drop a little at a time into boiling soup. (Note: To do this, I used a teaspoon and only put batter on the tip.)
Thickening the Soup
If you would like the soup a little thicker, do the following.
In a small saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons Crisco (or oil), add 2 tablespoons flour and cook for 2 minutes. Add 1/2 teaspoon of paprika. Add some of the soup liquid to the saucepan. Then add it to the soup.
If you do not thicken the soup, still add the 1/2 teaspoon of paprika to the soup mixture.
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