Ham Bone Soup... At Last

It's the Monday after Mother's Day and I had such an awesome time yesterday. They spoiled me rotten from beginning to end.

I hope they spoiled you too!!

Today's weather is so much different from this time last week. That's what spring is like here in San Diego. You never know quite what to expect. And where as last week summer was teasing us, this week winter seems to be back.

Which makes it the perfect night for ham bone soup.

Remember when I put that meaty bone in the freezer last week?

Well it's coming out tonight.

Actually last night I stuck it in the fridge so I would have it ready to go into the crock pot first thing this morning for the soup.

This recipe comes from Mable Hoffman's Crockery Cookery.



Congressional Bean Soup
6-8 servings

8 cups water
1 pound dried small white beans
1 meaty ham bone
1 cup finely chopped celery (I also use the leaves)
1 onion, chopped
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 bay leaf

Soak the beans, in water, overnight. Drain the beans and add to the crock pot. Add the rest of the ingredients. Cover and cook on low for 12-14 hours or until beans are very soft. Remove bay leaf and ham bone. Cut the meat off the bone and return the meat to the crock pot. Discard bone and bay leaf. Serve soup hot.

This is a delicious, stick to your ribs, warm you up soup.

I'm also making corn muffins to serve with it. I plan to use the jiffy brand corn muffin mix. I like this brand because it doesn't have trans fats or names of ingredients that I cannot pronounce.

I'm going to make the muffins into mini muffins. I like to make mini muffins because I like the ratio of crust to bread.

And that is this gal's view for today.

Easy Meatball Soup

Leftovers, you either love them or hate them, but if you're trying to save money you really should learn to work with them.

Some leftovers are delish in their original form...and may even taste better as the flavors have had time to blossom. Others need to be revamped.

And that's where I come in...a leftovers thread!!

I won't give you every idea all at once, but as I think of things I'll post them here.

So here goes...

Today's lunch was from leftovers.

I made spaghetti and meatballs a couple of weeks ago. And that is a good leftover in it's original for. Spaghetti just seems to get better and better each time you heat it up. But after a few rounds I had run out of spaghetti noodles and was left with just a few meatballs and some sauce. Not even enough for meatball sandwiches, which I love!

So I put it in a small container and labeled it "for meatball soup" and stuck it in the freezer. And today, since there was only three of us for lunch and we were suffering from sandwich fatigue I remembered that container.

I took it out of the freezer this morning and left it on the kitchen counter. At lunch time I poured it in a saucepan and added a fair amount of chicken broth. I always have boxes (better than canned, I think) in the pantry. I brought it to a boil and I added a handful of egg noodles. I cooked it until the noodles were done, about 10 minutes. And viola, in no time at all we had home made meatball soup for lunch. And it wasn't from a can, it was real food! I put out some sour dough bread slices and some butter and we were set.

And that's this gal's view for today.