Yes, this soup is all of those things. It’s so good. I made it last night for dinner and just had the rest (a 1/2 bowl) for lunch. Yum! 

I’ve been wanting to make black bean soup for a couple months now and I’ve had 2 cans of black beans in my pantry just waiting to be used. I don’t know what happened or why I didn’t make it, but I’m fairly sure I bought these cans of beans the LAST TIME we were here at the RV Ranch in Keene… That means they’ve been out to San Francisco, over to Winnemucca, NV; Rawlins, WY; Hermosa & Salem, SD; up to Hillsboro, ND; down to Council Bluffs, IA; through Oklahoma City; back to Keene, TX; up to Sparta, KY via West Memphis, AR; and back down here via Dickson, TN and Texarkana. These are, were, some travelin’ beans!

Allen and I both put on a little teensy tiny bit of hibernation weight in North Dakota so I’m all about trying to make healthy meals for us this year!  Not to mention, as I’m sure a lot of folks are right now, we are just hanging on until tax return time! The holidays combined with three weeks off work are fun and all, but we are definitely feeling that now!

Anyway, I try to save these recipes I find as bookmarks on my phone or write them down somewhere but this one just disappeared… So I went searching via Google yesterday and found recipes from the Pioneer Woman (I love most of her recipes for just about everything), Epicurious (Jennifer from Tyler, TX specifically-I did write that down!), and Food Network…

I didn’t have all the ingredients for any of them so I mixed and matched and used what I had… Here’s my version:

Cheap, Easy, Healthy, Delicious Black Bean Soup

• 1-2 tbs bacon grease
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 4 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 jalapeno, some of the ribs and seeds removed, diced
• dash of oregano
• dash of cayenne pepper
• dash of ancho chili pepper
• dash of chili powder
• a large dash of cumin
• 2 cups of beef broth
• 2 cans low sodium black beans, undrained
• 1 roma tomato, diced
• 1-2 tbs jarred salsa
• about a 1/2 cup frozen corn, maybe more
• salt to your liking
• palmful of chopped cilantro

Saute onion and jalapeño in bacon grease over medium heat until just getting soft. Then add garlic. Add all the spices. Once the garlic begins to get fragrant, give it about 30 more seconds and add the broth. Stir to combine, bring to a boil. Add your beans and give those a stir. Then add corn, as much as you prefer really. Once the corn warms up, give it a taste. I probably added about a teaspoon of salt, maybe a tad more, but I didn’t measure. Let that simmer for about 20 minutes to bring the flavors together then stir in your cilantro. I topped mine with a dollop of sour cream and more cilantro, with a little bit of green onion last night. Today for lunch I topped it with a diced avocado and that was absolutely scrumptious!