"Blessings" Soup

Hello Everyone. I'm so thankful it is Thursday. The weekend is almost here, and it very relaxing to be able to plan to stay home and take care of my family without any distractions for the weekend. We are very busy, and work different shifts. So a lot of the time Pappy and I are like "two ships that pass in the night". But finally, the last few years we both are off the weekends, so that is really nice for our family time.

But anyway. I want to welcome you all to Bama Cooking. If this is your first time to look at my blog, I am so glad you stopped by. Today I am going to talk about something I cook at least once a month. That is "Blessings" Soup. I think of it as Blessings Soup because my family is blessed to always have plenty of food to eat and share, and we are thankful for this. When I have lots of bits and pieces of things left in the refrigerator, I clean out the fridge, and make soup. It is never the same twice, but always good. I once had a friend, Mary, who said if I had leftovers every day, then I cooked too much, because she never had leftovers at her house. I told her that if I didn't have leftovers, I didn't think I'd cooked enough, and would wonder if someone was still hungry! Now I will outline what I put in my soup today, to help you see that it really is as easy as scraping out bowls and letting your pot simmer!

When I began to clean out the fridge, I found: one cup of turnip greens, black eyed peas, ham, two venison steaks that looked a little tough, corn, macaroni and cheese, and homemade scalloped potatoes. I dumped everything in the pot, including the venison steaks. I left them whole, and decided if they didn't become tender, I would fish them out and give them to the dog. I chopped up the potatoes a little, also. To the refrigerator finds, I added a quart jar of tomatoes canned from our garden, a frozen quart bag of okra from our garden, an onion, and filled the pot with water. I sprinkled salt, pepper, and my favorite spice, Soul Food Seasoning. I let the soup cook for a couple of hours. I pulled the steaks out onto a plate, and shredded them with two forks, then added them back into the pot. The soup is a wonderful golden color. I didn't think about it before hand, but I guess it is from cheese in the mac and cheese and the scalloped potatoes. This soup is delicious. A smoky ham flavor in a "potato soup" texture. It was great and we all liked it. No one complained or noticed the turnip greens! With the soup, I served salad and corn bread.

This soup is always better the second day, after the flavors have blended together. But it is good anytime! My husband is not a big fan of soup, but he never complains when we have our Blessings Soup. I hope this soup becomes a habit of your family as well. Sometimes if we don't have many leftovers, I will put my leftovers in a freezer bag, and try again next month! But one of the best things about this soup is it is just about free!

I hope you all have a great weekend and I will see you again tomorrow! Honey