Black Bean Soup

One of my all-time favorites, I remember my mom ordering black bean soup at the now long-gone Espinosas (a Chatfield favorite). As I've grown to unabashedly adore beans of all kinds, black bean soup has been on my to-cook list for a while so the other night, I finally tried and based on boyfriend reviews (which might be slightly biased) succeeded. Here is my ramshackle black bean soup that I threw together out of my college-student pantry and turned out to be extremely quick and tasty.

Black Bean Soup

Recipe:

1 can black beans, juice poured off, but not strained

2.5 cans water (fill the black bean can)

1 large handful of brown rice

.5 medium onion, coarsely chopped

6 pieces cooked bacon (I used turkey bacon because I like it better)

1 large tomato diced

1-1.5 Tbs. chili powder (to taste)

1.5 Tbs. garlic powder (or 1 garlic clove if you have one)

handful of chopped, fresh cilantro

1 tablespoon of your favorite salsa (I use my homemade salsa)

salt and fresh ground pepper to taste

OPTIONAL:

crumbled feta cheese for topping

sour cream for topping

Directions:

1. Sauté garlic (if you have it) and onions until onions are transparent.

2. Pour excess liquid off beans, put beans, rice, water, tomatoes, onions, cilantro, salsa and cooked bacon in large pot.

3. Bring mixture to boil and then reduce heat to simmer

4. Season mixture with garlic powder (if garlic cloves weren't used), chili powder, salt and pepper to taste.

5. Allow mixture to simmer until it has reduced to your desired consistency and the rice is cooked through(mine took about 10 minutes). Extra water can be added and reduced if the soup becomes to thick.

6. Serve hot with crumbled feta cheese, sour cream or both.

7. Eat up!

P.S. Sorry if this picture isn't the most appealing, we ate it so fast that the soup was almost completely gone before I remembered to take a picture.