navy bean soup recipe (with measurements)

 Apparently 'eyeballing' and experimenting with ingredients isn't as common as it was when I was learning to cook - so I made this recipe again as an actual recipe with measurements.  I 'scientifically' tested it out- and it worked fine.  Bonus is I now have two quarts of soup to eat this week at work :)

 

 

 Navy Bean Soup (with measurements)

makes two quarts (or two pints and a quart, which is how I put it up for convenience) 

 Note : This recipe was created to make a specific point of how to use dried beans, to have that in my 'cooking arsenal' and know how long it would take to make it correctly.  My daughter had wondered how to cook the beans from dry state, and there are SO many versions out there I wanted something I had done myself to show her a good method.  I use a lot of lentils and split peas, but dried beans do take patience and time to prepare properly.  Navy beans are small and cook up well into soups like this.  Dried beans are a lot cheaper than canned beans, are very available in many places and keep very well.  They keep even better when stored in a cabinet in a tight container like a coffee can, to prevent cabinet fly getting into the plastic bags.  You could use canned beans for this, just figure out what quantity you like and of course, it would make it quicker as the canned beans would already be at the softened state, just heat it up with the vegetables in it until they are done and blend it. 

The Method / Recipe :

In a large pot rinse one cup of navy beans - fresher beans are best, pick out any discolored or bits of other things (stem, gravel whatever, depends on your brand, they're much better about that than they were when I was a kid, as well)

pour out rinse water, add 4 cups of clean water to pot with beans

add 1 tablespoon of distilled white vinegar

Do NOT add salt or oil

put on stove and bring to a rolling boil - let it boil like that stirring for a bit, the beans may rise to the top and become sort of wrinkled

turn off the heat, remove pot from heat, add a lid to the pot, let sit undrained for 1 HOUR

 

After one hour :

add about a tablespoon of olive oil

add rosemary and garlic powder, flake, minced whatever you like 

add some ham or bacon or kielbasa if you want (it helps a lot to add fat but you don't want to overwhelm or add too much saltiness)  I used one round of Canadian bacon that Mark had bought for pizza, cut up very fine

optional : black pepper, ground brown mustard seed and/or celery seed

 

Put pot back on heat and bring back to a boil, stir well.

bring down to a simmer, where it just barely bubbles or not even quite bubbling but close, keep at this heat for 1.5 hours or so, stirring occasionally

remove a bean or two onto a plate and try to mash it with the back of a spoon

if it mashes easily, it is time to continue - if not, stir well and keep at temperature for another half hour, test again - if you had added salt before, it will be very difficult to get this to work well, as the beans may have hardened, so no SALT other than what might have already been in the meat 

 if mashable : add several good handfuls of diced zucchini and another of sliced onion, carrots might work in this or bok choy tops and bottoms - I've done the latter with no real change in taste but have been wondering if I might put carrots in it or if that taste would be too different

I also add some Garlic Parmesan grill seasoning at this point, because it is VERY good, but I know it has salt in it, so I don't add it earlier.

bring pot back to a boil, then simmer for 20 minutes or so until the vegetables are well cooked - I have my veggies in the freezer, so this works well for them

take entire pot off of heat, put on a towel or trivet on a counter, and blend with a stick blender until smooth 

Either serve when cooled with bread and maybe some shredded cheese or : Pour up into two clean glass quart jars or two pints and a quart, leaving about an inch at the top of each jar - place tops on and put in refrigerator after they have cooled on the counter some, using within four to five days.  This will not keep out of the refrigerator, and it is best to use it as soon as you can, but I routinely get four or five days out of it before it is gone.

Another nice variation for serving : add several tablespoons of diced mild green chiles to the pot when rewarming, and then tear up flour tortilla into very small pieces, heat with the soup and it becomes almost a noodle.   

 

Madeleine cookies :

It seems I have to keep putting this recipe back up in multiple places because either I'm spelling it off, or the algorithm just really doesn't like to give it back to me when I ask.  It has went as far as to say that the website doesn't have a recipe for it - when in fact, it probably has about four different ones.  I make this sometimes once a week, but not too much more often than that - and know I've posted the recipe several times over the years although it always does fluctuate some.

What I'm using lately for the Madeleine recipe - also called magdalenas in Catalan

3 large chicken eggs, set out on counter to warm up and beat with 1 tsp of vanilla extract, 1/2 cup of white sugar plus 1 softened stick of butter plus 2 tbsp of dark brown sugar - beat together for a total of FIVE minutes - then mix in 1 cup (little more) of white flour (that has come out of the freezer a few minutes beforehand) and 1 tsp of baking powder and less than 1/2 tsp of salt - mix dry ingredients in portions into the wet mixture. 375 preheated oven, each well of the madeleine pan brushed with butter and coated with flour, fill wells up only half way, and remove from oven as soon as the outer bits of the cookie begins to brown in the pan and a finger pressed makes the cookie bounce back - turn out onto plate to prevent it from overcooking in the madeleine pan.  All that bit about pouring in melted butter at one point and/or chilling the dough before baking it -- I tried that time and again, and found it really didn't matter in the end product at least not to me.

 Madeleine cookies

3 large eggs

1 tsp of vanilla extract (mixed with the eggs) 

1/2 cup of white sugar

2 tbsp of dark brown sugar

1/2 cup (one stick) of pre-softened butter

1 to 1 and 1/4 cups of all purpose flour

1 tsp of baking powder

1/2 tsp little less of salt

375 degree oven, 10 minutes or less

this recipe should fill 2 madeleine pans, each well about 1/2 full or so 

 

 

 

rabbit rabbit it's August

 

Library books, probably won't finish them but there is a chance I'll read them, the one on the right is about Paris, and magic, but the text is on the small side.  The center one is about a Native American community, and the library has the sequel out which made me go see if they had the first one.  The one on the left was on sale for two dollars and the premise is quite scary and intriguing (future, one child per family, identical twins and mother died, father made an elaborate ruse in her memory to appear as if there was only one daughter and now the daughters are older and trying to figure out how to go on when they only have one identity and fear of death on discovery).  But, now that I own that one - however intriguing it is, I will look at the other two first since they are two weeks loan.

 

our local library had such cute children's decorations I had to take a picture of it - mushroom window, waterfall in the back (out of streamers) and paper chain tree leaves on a column made to look like a trunk (complete with owl)

we had donated a lot of coleus one day after a farmer's market trip - and they put some out front in planters :)  We were so glad they were loved

the community garden raised beds were full of interesting plants

 

Also, little chicken did not improve, and I think perhaps she also had a fractured bone in her leg that had actually caused the other problems and was the reason she could not improve even with warm baths and eye-dropper feeding.  There wasn't anything else we could do for her, and she wasn't eating and barely drinking.  Esme was sad, but we did what we could - cleaned up all the care things this morning and then I continued and cleaned out some garden beds and the dry goods pantry - trying to sort my brain out, by sorting what is in front of me ie ie....  I hate losing one, even when there are twenty - and twenty was a bit much for us, but when you buy them small you almost expect to lose several - and we were lucky in that we raised all of the last batch to adulthood and hadn't lost any of the batch before (which we had also expected).  We let them have as long of lives as they can, whether or not if they are laying eggs keeping up 'production'.    At the same time we don't do anything elaborate, like the heated houses that look better than doghouses that I see, or go out and spend hours with them every day as I see online as well.  We will give them greens and vegetable cuttings and make sure they have layer feed twice a day and clean water, and collect the eggs - that's a pretty good life for a chicken, especially around here.

Knitting a little this morning, going to go take a look at that crochet bear or cat I was working on.  Doing laundry and sweeping and wishing I had more energy to go further and deep clean other things but the pantry did need it.  I want to 'make it better' on a lot of little things but the little things add up.  That is good - because they should add up to better, but they also add up in exhaustion, so a little at a time, easy does it et al.  And I washed one of the dogs, she is always so sensitive she was begging me to give her another bath.  She hasn't quite figured out how to distinctly ask for a bath - but I've been getting more signals from her a few times lately and trying to see if we can get an actual trained signal.    I finally studied amigurumi stitches and see what I'm doing that makes the weave not tight enough - will see on the next if I can correct that.  We do plan, at least Esme and I, to go sell at the market this afternoon, and then we need groceries tonight or tomorrow.

Doing French at the high-grammar level, Chinese at the lowest level when the French grammar annoys me, and Spanish on my phone although that is a higher grammar level as well and I might have to switch down to something else there for a little bit, as well.