White bean and beet green soup (B)

August 24, 2006 at 4:05 pm (Beans, Beans and greens, B_minus (2.5 stars), Dark leafy greens, My brain, Quick weeknight recipe, soup)

Lately I’ve been too tired to cook much for dinner, and have just been throwing some white beans and veggies in a pot and calling it “soup.” But today my improvised soup came out better than normal.

a spray of canola oil
1 small dark green, mild chile pepper (don’t recall what type it was)
beet greens from one small bunch of beets (maybe 1/3 cup chopped greens?)
1/2 cup white beans + some of the bean cooking liquid
a little water

I let that cook for a bit until the pepper and greens were soft then added:
1/2 Tbs. nutritional yeast
1/2 Tbs. parmesan cheese
some soysauce to taste

The beet greens went very well with the pepper and beans. I think it was better than the kale and white bean combo I had last night. The yeast and parmesan gave the soup a full body and flavor.

I tried making something similiar to this again today, but with kale. I forgot about it and let it boil on high for probably a good 10 minutes. The kale got that unappetizing color and flavor that is a common result of boiling it. The soup was edible but not great. When will I learn?

Update Oct 2007: I sauteed 1 mild 6-inch green chile in 1 tsp. olive oil, then threw in about 1.5 cups raw beet greens. I added 1 cup large white beans and 1/2 cup bean juice, plus 2 cups vegetable broth. When everything was cooked I added 1 Tbs. newt and 1/2 ounce parm. The beans were salted so it didn’t need soy sauce. The soup was unfortunately, pretty gross (for lack of a better word). The broth was almost like a thin nutritional yeast gravy–wrong texture for sure, and not even very tasty. Why, oh why, can’t I make beans and greens soup consistently?

Rating: B