Healthy & Delicious Soup

Sweet Potato, Rice and Black Bean Soup

My family enjoys eating soup all winter long. We especially love this easy and delicious Sweet Potato, Rice and Black Bean Soup,
which gladly uses up any sweet potatoes left over from your fall crop.

Whatever you do, please don’t tell my kids that there are sweet potatoes in this soup. After all these years of eating it, they think that the delicious orange morsels are not sweet potatoes but carrots, and I'm not about to tell them differently!






Introducing the Stars of the Show:
8 cups water, vegetable broth, or chicken broth
1 pound sweet potatoes (about 3 cups) peeled, diced
2 cups or 1 (15 oz) can black beans (or any type of beans will do), rinsed and drained
2 cups cooked brown rice (You can substitute wild rice or a mixture of the two)
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup chopped onion
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or 2 teaspoons dried parsley
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper

Place all ingredients in a large stockpot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note: If you are still using canned beans…STOP! 

Dried beans are so much cheaper and healthier for you and the environment. Just put 4 cups of any type of dried beans in the crockpot and fill crockpot with water one inch from the top. If you choose, you can add salt or any other seasonings to taste. Cover with lid and turn crockpot on high. Cook beans around 6-8 hours, and voilá!

 You will have a whole crockpot full of delicious, tender beans waiting for you to put in Ziploc bags for the freezer. (This will make a large portion. You can decrease the amount of beans to 2 cups and cover with water 2 inches over the top. Cook the same amount of time.)

 When you are ready to make the recipe, just take out one of the Ziploc bags from the freezer and let it thaw.


 
Now back to our soup….

Heat all ingredients to boiling. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes.
Discard bay leaf. (This is such an important step that you won’t want to forget, because if you do, your soup will contain little bits of tough pieces of bay leaf. I am speaking from experience!)

Next, put half the soup in a food processor, blender, or handheld mixer and puree until smooth. (You may need to do this in two batches to avoid the hot soup popping the lid off your blender.) Return to pot and cook 10 more minutes.

Now it’s time to grab a bowl and dig in… that is, if your kids will let you!

Try one of my other delicious recipes for Southwestern Lentil and Black Bean Soup.
By Shawn Neal