Ham and bean soup

I wanted to share a recipe that's been a family favorite for years. I grew up with it and every winter I start craving it. It's also about the easiest recipe ever.

Ingredients
1 lb bag of dried 15 beans
Ham

The ham can be almost any kind. My mom usually made this soup after a ham dinner and just throws the ham bone (with the left over ham) in the soup. Sometimes I just use thick ham slices or ham chunks. It's really up to you but it has to be thick enough that it doesn't disintegrate while cooking.

Put the beans in a big bowl and put enough water in it that the beans are covered. Let them soak overnight.

In the morning, rinse them and put them in a crock pot. Cover with water. Add any seasoning you want. I usually just do garlic powder, onion powder, and salt.
Cover and let it cook for a couple hours. Stir occasionally.

After a couple hours, add the ham. If its a ham bone you can add it sooner. The only reason to wait for adding the ham is so it doesn't fall apart. Don't wait too long to add the ham though because you want the ham flavor in the soup.

By the evening, the beans are soft and it is ready to go. I like mine cooked a little longer so that the beans have turned into kind of mush but its a personal preference.

This recipe is enough food for a few people. The beans are only a couple dollars a bag so its super cheap and goes a long way. It's delicious, filling and gluten free. Only two ingredients and a crock pot. Can't get easier than that!

(Pictured below are the kinds of ham and beans I used most recently for this recipe. Although the beans say "Cajun" I just don't use the Cajun packet they include. I used about half of the ham. )

Brown Rice Snaps

NOTE- Because I haven't had time to sit down and write a long entry about all the products I've tried I've decided to use my new blogger app to make small entries on individual products. I will try to stay up to date. Also, if there is a product you are curious about, tell me and I'll try to find it and tell you what I think.

These crackers are organic, gluten free, dairy free, salt free and have no genetically modified ingredients. They are made from rice.

They are kind of hard to eat plain. They are dry and tasteless. I have also tries honey and jelly on them. It helps but still not that good. I started eating them because my doctor put me on a low-iodine diet so I wasn't allowed to eat salt. Finding foods that are salt free and gluten free is nearly impossible.

I didn't really care for these until I tried them with hummus. Yummus! Haha yes I know, I'm not funny. Anyway, it was spinach artichoke hummus and it was delicious with these crackers. I tried the hummus with carrots and GF pretzels too. I like the carrots with it better than the pretzels but my 4 year old loves the pretzels with it. (I will post on the brand of hummus and pretzels later.)

This brand of cracker comes in different flavors but since I only tried the plain, salt free ones I can only judge these, not the brand.

Overall I think I'd give these crackers 2 stars out of 5. They are dry and plain but if eaten with the right topping can be pretty good.