White bean soup
This is the Galician white bean soup recipe, known as caldo gallego adapted to the ingredients at hand.
Instructions
- Wash the beans, cover with cold water and soak for 8 hours or overnight.
- Drain, discarding the soaking water. Put the beans into a large soup or stock pot and add 2 quarts (8 cups or 2 l) water, or enough to cover the beans, and bring to a boil.
- When the liquid starts boiling, add the ham and bacon. Reduce heat and simmer for about 1¼ hours. Add more cold water if required.
- Add paprika, olive oil, potatoes and greens. Simmer for 30 minutes or until beans are tender. Don't add salt before testing first, the ham usually brings a strong flavor. Season.
- Dice the ham discarding the bone, if you are going to serve the ham with the soup, and serve very hot.
Notes
Use any of beet greens, shredded cabbage, turnip greens, mustard greens, kale, collard greens.
Preparing this soup with a pressure cooker is easy. Just put all the ingredients together and cover with water, about an inch over the solid ingredients. Beans usually take about 25 minutes once the pressure cooking has kicked in, but it depends on the model. Follow the manufacturers instructions.
Quick soup
Use 2 cans (Net WT 15 oz) white beans of any kind. Drain and wash the beans, use cooked ham hock or serrano ham and can omit bacon. Cover the beans with water and bring to boil, add the rest of the ingredients. Simmer until the potatoes and cabbage are cooked, about 20-30 minutes. Check the salt.
Source
The traditional white bean soup prepared in Galicia, Spain with their local ham (lacon), local lard or bacon (unto) green vegetables (grelos) and potatoes (cachelos), ask for "Caldo Gallego" or "Pote Gallego" if you visit the region. Grelos are a kind of turnip green and as such they have a bitter taste. Grelos can be substituted by other vegetable, if not available, a favorite is cabagge. Lacon, Galician ham, can be very salty and often has to be soaked in water for long hours to wash the salt away.