White Bean & Kale Soup

This is a nice simple healthy soup to make, especially when it's cold. This type of soup can be easily done with many other bean types & vegetables. You can cook your beans the day before or the day of making the soup, and once the beans are cooked it takes basically no time at all to make this soup. Happy cooking!

Ingredients:

1 cup of white beans (I used great northern beans, but most varieties will work)

water - as needed for cooking beans

1/2 head of kale

2 celery stalks

1 yellow onion

1 large carrot

2 garlic cloves

1 tomato

1/4 cup of pasta stars

1/2 white wine

chili flakes - as needed

extra virgin olive oil - as needed

salt & freshly ground black pepper- as needed

1/2 lemon juiced

handful of chopped parsley

1 chicken bullion 

To make:

Start by cooking your beans which have been soaked the night before or for 5 hours or so - drain and rinse soaking water, add new cold water and cover beans completely. You can add a sprinkle of baking soda to beans (This is supposed to reduce cooking time and soften skin - some claim it helps remove some of the gassiness beans are so famous for), I never add salt to cooking beans because it actually toughens up the skin and takes longer to cook. Meanwhile, in a heavy bottomed pot start sauteing up diced onion, carrots and celery in olive oil - then add garlic. Next you can add the chopped up kale (make sure to remove the large rib out the middle of the kale - it's not so pleasant to eat), then add diced tomato saute for a bit then add in white wine and completely reduce all. Once beans are cooked add beans and all the cooking liquid to the sauteed vegetables (add some more liquid if you need to). Add chicken bullion (optional) and pasta stars, chili flakes, salt & pepper.... once stars are done (should be al dente) garnish with parsley and a squeeze of lemon juice, but make sure not to add lemon juice till you are done cooking - as this would make the lemon bitter.