Ham and Beans

A great Wintry soup is Ham and Beans.  This was a soup my father made with the leftover ham bone - whenever we had a bone-in ham when I was growing up.  He wanted more of the flavor and marrow than me and would actually saw the bone into 3 or 4 inch pieces but I don't.  I just chuck the whole bone in or if I want the soup and have no ham I buy a couple of ham hocks from the store.  I served this on Sunday to our Military students and a few other ward members.  It was a big hit.  It is amazing how something so simple can taste so good.  It is fairly inexpensive too!

Ham and Bean Soup
1 pound dried navy beans or small white beans for every 6-8 servings.
Either soak the beans overnight or if you forget to do that just cover the beans with water and bring to boil.  Boil for 5 minutes.  Turn of the stove and let the beans sit for at least 1 hour.  Rinse the beans and the stockpot and put the beans back in the pot.  Add the ham bone or the ham hocks.  Splash in about 4 splashes of liquid smoke for every pound of beans you are cooking or if you can find it you can use smoke flavored salt (I have gotten so I like the liquid smoke better).  Cover the beans with water and let simmer.  Keep the beans just covered and stir about every hour until they are tender - this will take from 2 1/2 to 3 hours - depending on how hard your simmer is.  Salt and pepper to taste. About 1/2 hour before serving, take the bone or hocks out and remove any usable meat off of them.  Cut the meat into bite sized pieces.  Add any other ham you would like to the soup at this time so it heats through but don't add any more water.  You want a fairly thick soup, so you want it to reduce to the consistency you desire.  Serve.  As with any soup, this one is always better the second day

Note: I  have actually used leftover deli-ham in my soup when I have had some laying around, just to use it up before it goes bad.  Usually I have some in the freezer just for this purpose.