Smoky Black Bean Soup

The hubs and I have a real thing for plantain chips lately.  If you haven’t tried them, they’re like extra thick starchy potato chips.  So yeah, it’s not like they’re health food, but they do have this fun perk… Unlike the banana chips you typically find in the store, they’re savory instead of sweet and don’t have any added sugar.  We discovered this during our 30-day challenge to exclude added sugars, and we may have gone overboard.  (It turns out that when your only nutritional strategy is to avoid added sugar, you end up eating a lot of cheese and chips.  Maybe don’t follow my example.)

Anyways, I’ve been questing for a good recipe for black bean soup for a while, and they can be challenging.  It’s not unusual to find recipes that are a little on the bland side, and the leftovers end up sitting in the fridge for way too long while you struggle to finish them off.

THIS is my new official black bean soup recipe.  The plantain chip garnish just happened to help draw me in, but everything about the soup is fantastic.  It’s SPICY, and it’s SMOKY!  And as the recipe author, Joy, suggests, serving it with white rice and plantain chips is just about as close to perfect as any bowl of black bean soup can be.  Eating this soup pretty much feels like a vacation in Cuba.  (Not that I would know.  Maybe it feels like a vacation in Miami… And who doesn’t want to simulate a vacation in Miami in the winter?)

Best of all, as long as you’re using at least a little restraint on the rice and chips, this soup is incredibly nutritious thanks to a generous dose of fiber from the beans and veggies.  Knock yourself out.

The recipe can be found on the website of one of my favorite food bloggers and general heroes, Joy the Baker.  Here’s a link to her Smoky Black Bean Soup.  I made the recipe exactly as directed, except that I was far too impatient to wait for my beans to soak, so I used four cans of drained and rinsed black beans instead of the one pound of dry beans.  I know it’s tempting to just make the soup and not worry about the garnishes, but I’m telling you, the plantain chips drew me in, and the white rice made me keep coming back.  It’s worth springing for both.  Just do it.