BLOG FAIL + Baked Bean Soup

Holy blog neglect, Batman!

I'm so sorry I epically fail at being a blogger :(

But hey! Here I am! BLOGGING! I was inspired.

Lately, I've been in serious love with my crockpot. We moved to Michigan (if you didn't know--that is part of my blog-neglect), and, well...it's cold here. Also, I love this website: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com

This woman used nothing but her crockpot for a WHOLE YEAR. She is also gluten free, for all you GFers out there!

Last week, I made an Ethiopian chicken soup/stew, but it was meh. Tonight, I made a Baked Bean Soup, adapted from her recipe. SO GOOD.  She says it would taste like a can of pork-n-beans, and I'm not sure about all THAT...but it did taste like baked bean goodness. We got about 4 servings out of it (I had a big bowl, Craig had 2 big bowls, and I have a good sized one for lunch)--that means probably 6 servings if you have some salad and bread to go along. We didn't have either at the moment, so we had Original (not Cheddar) Goldfish with ours.

...we're classy.

Baked Bean Soup (adapted from Stephanie O'Dea's recipe!)
(our adaptation was to add the sausage, see note at the end)

1 15oz can white kidney beans (or great northern or other white beans), undrained
1 onion, finely diced (we used half an onion--don't like too much)
1c finely diced carrot (I only had one huge carrot I peeled and cut into chunks)
3tsp dijon mustard
2tsp apple cider vinegar
1Tbsp soy sauce (you can find GF ones--I think La Choy is)
2Tbsp unsulphered molassas (most is)
1Tbsp chili powder (we are wimps and used 3/4 Tbsp)
1 can fire roasted tomatoes, undrained
2 c. water
*turkey sausage (we used some smoked turkey sausage, the kind that's already pretty much cooked and you just heat it up, like Hillshire Farm), veggie sausage, or an additional can of beans.*

1. Dump the beans in the slowcooker
2. Add onion, carrot, mustard, vinegar, soy sauce, molassas, and chili powder.
3. Add tomatoes and water.
4. Cook on LOW 7-8 hours
5. CAREFULLY puree the soup with a stick/immersion blender, OR puree about 1 cup of the soup in a regular blender (don't burn yourself!) and add back to the crockpot.
6. Add cut-up sausage or another can of beans (I'd drain and rinse these).
7. Cook on low until heated through.
8. Salt to taste, serve.

I might add the additional can of beans anyway, even with some sausage, as I kind of pureed up all my beans with my stick blender (it's hard not to!). If you are a vegetarian and not adding any meat or meat sub, I'd definitely add the second can of beans for some added texture. If you have kiddos, they may like it with cut up hot dogs.

This one is a keeper!

And I promise to blog more. I've said it before, I know..but I promise. And Christmas is coming! I'll take some photos of the tasty feast, and maybe even get Grandma's chicken squares recipe!