Put the soup on . . . it’s Supper Club Time

Our Full Moon Supper Club continues to meet monthly on or near the full moon and our January hostess had a bountiful idea—everyone bring a crock pot of soup plus containers to take home leftovers. What an easy and long-lasting meal that turned out to be!

We had a good variety of soups to choose from: tomato and quinoa, Portuguese kale and sausage, cheesy tortellini, white bean, potato and my Mexican turkey and bean. Add bread and dessert and you have a meal for many, or a meal for the seven of us who attended then took home leftovers.

I would love to see your favorite soup recipe, so feel free to post it in the comments section. I won’t say the one I’m posting is my favorite (I have lots of favorite soups), but it’s a filling choice when there’s leftover turkey in the freezer and you have dry beans you want to use. I’ve only slightly varied this recipe from the original version I clipped out of Cooking Light magazine years ago.

Mexican Turkey and Bean Soup

Ingredients:

1 tsp. olive oil
½ C chopped onion
1 C coarsely chopped cooked turkey
1 ½ tsp. ground cumin
¼ tsp. garlic powder (or added chopped garlic)
1/8 tsp. red pepper or hot pepper sauce
16 oz. cooked navy beans (if using canned, rinse them)
15 oz. cooked chickpeas (garbanzos, and again, if using canned, rinse them)
16 oz. fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth
4.5 oz. can chopped green chiles, drained
¾ cup wild or brown rice (can use quick-cooking type)
sour cream and tortilla chips to top

Heat olive oil and sauté chopped onion 5 minutes or so. Stir in chopped turkey and next 8 ingredients. Bring to boil; cover and reduce heat to simmer for 15 minutes. Stir in rice and cook until rice is done. Enjoy!

Haitian Rice and Beans

Just about daily I chat online with my friend Juana Rodriguez who is working in Haiti to improve living conditions. Her dream is to establish a cocoa farm that would give people dignified work while also protecting the land. Those sorts of dreams can be very difficult to bring to reality in a country of so much poverty. But like the people of Haiti, Juana is resilient. She moves forward, even if conditions dictate moving at a slow pace.

Yolantha Harrison-Pace is another woman I think of when Haiti comes to mind. An artist who lives in Kentucky, Yolantha visited Haiti prior to the 2010 earthquake and returned to write a chapbook called, Nobody Knows the Haiti I’ve Seen. Besides relating stories of the land and people she came to know, Yolantha also included recipes from Haiti. She agreed to share one of these recipes with us for our simple Lenten meal of the week.

Haitian Rice and Beans

¼ cup fresh parsley
2 cloves garlic, minced
pinch of thyme
2 green onions, chopped
1/2 TBSP salt
2 TBSP oil
1 cup rice
2 cups cooked beans
1 1/2 cups vegetable broth
1 cup water

With a mortar and pestle, mash parsley, garlic, thyme, onion and salt into thick paste. Heat the paste and oil in a pot, add rice. Coat rice with oil, add vegetable broth, water and beans. Bring to boil. Reduce heat and cover, simmering until the rice is tender and water has been absorbed. Stir and serve hot.

As I eat my rice and beans, I also pray for Juana, Yolantha and people of Haiti.