Many Beans Soup

I don't follow recipes for making bean soup, I may do something differently each time. I wanted to record the particular method and ingredients I used a particular time, because the soup extra good and simple to make. The first night I served it, my 4 yr. old daughter ate almost the amount I as an adult would eat! The girls continued to eat it 3 more times during the week. Pretty good for beans, I think! It's great when they eat healthy foods well!

Variety of beans- ie baby lima, black, kidney, pinto, great northern, lima.
-Quicksoak, or soak overnight, according to package directions.
Cook in crockpot or stove-
-beans, and water according to package directions
-broth(mine was from the freezer some chicken drumstick broth and previous bean soup broth)
-bacon, snipped and browned
-salt to taste
-garlic and onion to taste. For me, I added some light shakes of garlic and onion powder at the end of cooking. The girls would notice if I added chopped or minced onion, and I don't have garlic cloves on hand.

I like to serve oat/rice/flax bread("Really Good Yeastbread" post) with this meal. Then something crunchy like carrot sticks or apple slices.

Bean soup is a really versatile thing. Choose a meat if desired, to help flavor- like a ham hock or bacon or even hamburger. I hear if you brown your meat first, you get more flavor (I wouldn't brown the ham hock or any bone). You can add vegetables such as carrots and celery and onions if your kids like them. You could add boullion but don't need to if you have enough flavor from other things. The beans boiling with a ham bone get flavorful- see recipes for this- I've only done it on the stove, I think the flavor would come out more than in a crockpot.