WHITE BEAN SOUP
This White Bean Soup is a hearty, delicious dish and perfect on a fall or winter day. We love it with fried cornbread.
Why You’ll Love This Hearty White Bean Soup
We love to make this recipe with dried white beans, but you can also use canned white beans if you like. This is a very versatile soup that you can make your own, but if you do add the ingredients we have listed, you will have a great hearty soup. Personally, we think fried cornbread is a wonderful addition.
Swaps For This Recipe
We have made this recipe without adding the bacon or the ham, and it was still wonderful! Some people don’t like okra and always ask if they can leave it out, and you can. We personally love okra, and it goes really well in this soup. You can also make this in the crock pot, but soak the beans first.
Other Delicious Soup Recipes:
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White Bean Soup
Ingredients
- 1/2 or 1 pound Great Northern dried beans I used a half pound in this recipe. If you use a pound of beans, double the ingredients
- 4 or 5 cups water
- Ham hock bacon pieces, or bacon grease for seasoning
- 1 small onion chopped
- 2 cups chopped okra
- 1 cup celery chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 4 ounce can green chilis, drained
- 1 14.5 ounce can chicken broth
- 1 14.5 ounce can petite diced tomatoes, undrained
- 1 teaspoon salt or to taste
Instructions
- Soak beans according to package directions, add to pot and cover with water. Add ham or seasoning meat and onion, celery, okra, garlic, chili powder, black pepper and bay leaves to pot.
- Cook until beans are tender (about an hour on simmer) adding more water if needed. Once beans are tender, add chicken broth, tomatoes, and green chilis. Cook another 15 or 20 minutes. Add salt to taste. (Never add salt to beans while cooking. It makes the beans tough). Makes 8 to 10 servings.
Notes
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Hi! I would love to try this one out. But one problem is, my family does not eat pork. I know, that a lot of Southern recipes ask for bacon drippins and such. What would you recommend as a substitute for pork flavoring?
You might try smoked turkey wings. I can’t think of anything else to substitute.
I use Goya Ham Flavored concentrate in a lot of my beans and greens. We love it.
This will be my first “Pot” for the coming season. I wish I had the ingredients right now, I love a hearty soup.
Could I omit the okra since husband does not like. Looks delicious as is to me but will fix w/o okra for him.
Yes, you can delete the okra.
this looks like a wonderful soup to make especially where it is cooler(here!!!) .. might even add small bits of ham….yum
love the white beans better than pinto …have never added okra but will next time …love bean soup ,corn bread and butter milk …me a coal miners daughter and nothing like bean soup in the colder months ..
I just made this with your baked chicken thigh recipe and yellow rice!! The best dish! yummmy 🙂
Can you use canned white beans instead of dried? Looks sooo good!
I made this and it was so good. My husband is diabetic and he was able to eat it to.I used turkey instead of pork and left out the okra. I know that isn’t southern without the okra but I just don’t like it. Sorry. Thanks for the recipes I really enjoy them and make a lot of them.
I made this last night.My husband said he LOVED IT!One of his favorite soups i ever made,after clam chowder I make for him..
Don’t know if it’ll work here but if you shred cabbage, plain old green cabbage, small it’ll disintegrate but add the body & flavor of meat. Your family will never know. And it’s good for you.
Could I saute the onions okra and celery in bacon grease and then add all to canned beans.
Yes, Joyce. I feel like that would work. Might not be as good but as a quick way to do it, would be fine.
What a delicious and hearty soup, especially this time of year. I like how you incorporated okra in it. My husband loves okra and would love this dish!
CAN YOU USE FROZEN OKRA?
What a great recipe. Who doesn’t like gumbo? And I have some frozen okra.
Are these essentially butterbeans? It looks delicious. I did something very similar a couple of months ago with sausages and wine. It was outstanding.