Let's use that leftover ham bone to make a great hearty and delicious ham and bean soup. There is nothing much more traditional than this classic soup. Please enjoy one of the best soups you can make at home.
Introduction and My Rating
This is my take on traditional Senate Bean Soup. It is a simple soup made with navy beans, ham hocks, and onion. It is always on the menu in the dining room of the United States Senate. There are two versions with one using mashed potatoes to thicken the soup.
I combined about five recipes and methods, so no specific inspiration piece other than the Senate recipe. Most recipes use chicken broth for all or part of the liquid, but by using the ham bone, we won't need the broth.
Some of the recipes suggested 8 hour cooking times on low even with non-soaked beans. It took the full 10 hours with the overnight soaked beans to be the right consistency.
Lastly, the amount of liquid varied from 6 cups to 12 cups. Many commenters thought the high end was just too much liquid. I suggest 6 cups. It did not completely cover the ham but was just right. They, like me, want a thicker bean soup.
My Rating
A low five for us ham and bean soup lovers. A nice 4 for everybody else.
🐖Ham Bone
The ham in the recipe is THE huge variable. Start with a "meaty" bone. If you stripped it, you would have no meat.
All hams have a huge amount of salt. Many hams have been covered with honey or other sweet products. Also, you have a large amount of fat, much of it on the surface.
All those things are a problem that could ruin your soup. So the preparation of the ham is critically important.
Use running water to remove surface sugar. Scrape off any fat that you can. And be careful with adding any sodium.
What if you don't have a ham bone?
You can use about 2 cups of diced ham, and instead of water, use chicken broth.
The Beans
The beans can be either navy or great northern beans. The navy beans are smaller and more traditional for this soup.
Either dry or pre-cooked beans will work fine in this recipe. But, this was a great recipe to start using dry beans. And if you're on a budget, it makes this soup extremely cheap considering you were going to toss that ham bone.
Precooked Beans
You should drain the beans and rinse them well to decrease any added salt. Of course, use low sodium products. The cooking time will decrease a few hours with precooked beans vs. the dry beans.
The 1 pound of dry will equal approximately three cans or one 48 oz jar of precooked beans.
Dried Beans
Generally, dry beans should be soaked before cooking. It was always done in the "good old days." A nice overnight soak was always done. Also, picking through the beans for pebbles and rocks was important. We frequently found them.
You will find recipes that don't soak. There is also a "rapid soak" method that involves bringing them to a boil for a few minutes then allowing to rest for an hour (Check Epicurious.com).
So does soaking the dry beans do anything?
The no-soak crowd apparently think soaking is a waste of time. Tradition says less gas and more even cooking.
Well, our friends at Cooks Illustrated in The Science of Good Cooking have done some testing and find that there is less gas.
Let me explain. There are some simple carbohydrates in beans that humans can not digest. But your intestinal bacteria can digest them which produces a lot of gas.
Soaking decreases these carbohydrates some but the rapid method even more. But neither method comes anywhere close to eliminating them. Now, don't you feel smarter?
✔️Tips
A Final Note on Salt
So just as a reminder, if you didn't read all the above, most hams have LOTS of salt. Don't add any until you're sure you need it.
The Vegetables
The carrot and celery are an option, but I thought they made it more interesting.
A diced potato added halfway through cooking will help thicken some. You can also add a half or a full cup of mashed potatoes near the end to thicken.
Storage
Good refrigerated for 3-4 days. Good in the freezer for 3-4 months.
📖Ham Recipes
Old Fashion Scalloped Potatoes and Ham
Puerto Rican Chuletón Soup AKA Xmas Ham Bone Soup
Ham Bone Vegetable Soup – Crock Pot Edition
🖼️Instructions
A nice meaty ham bone and some simple ingredients are all that's needed. Dry beans are in the picture, but you may use 48 oz. of pre-cooked navy or great northern beans.
Rinse 1 pound of navy or great northern dry beans. Pick through the beans for any stones or pebbles. Cover with water and allow to soak overnight.
Under running water, rinse any coating off a meaty ham bone. Also, scrape off any surface fat that you can. Add to a larger crock pot.
Dice 2 medium carrots, two ribs celery, and one medium onion. Carrot and celery are options but recommended.
Add the beans, carrots, celery, and onion to the crock pot. Add ½ teaspoon garlic powder, ½ teaspoon pepper, and one bay leaf. Add 6 cups of water.
Cook on low for 8 hours total if precooked beans and 10 hours for dry beans. Two hours before the end of cooking, remove ham bone to a cutting board. Allow the bone to cool for 10-15 minutes. Then remove all meat from the bone. Discard bone and any fat and waste.
Place meat back into the cooker and finish cooking. This is a good point to taste test for adding salt if needed.
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📖 Recipe
Crock Pot Ham Bone and Bean Soup
Ingredients
- 1 pound dry navy beans - or great northern; see note about precooked beans
- 1 ham bone - meaty
- 2 carrots - medium - diced - optional
- 2 ribs celery - - diced - optional
- 1 onion - medium - diced
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 bay leaf - optional
Instructions
- You may use one pound of dry beans or 48 oz. of pre-cooked beans.
- If using dry beans, rinse 1 pound of navy or great northern dry beans. Pick through the beans for any stones or pebbles. Cover with water and allow to soak overnight.
- Under running water, rinse any coating off a meaty ham bone. Also, scrape off any surface fat that you can. Add to a larger crock pot.
- Dice 2 medium carrots, two ribs celery, and one medium onion. Carrot and celery are options but recommended.
- Add the beans, carrots, celery, and onion to the crock pot. Add ½ teaspoon garlic powder, ½ teaspoon pepper, and one bay leaf. Add 6 cups of water.
- Cook on low for 8 hours total if precooked beans and 10 hours for dry beans. Two hours before the end of cooking, remove ham bone to a cutting board. Allow the bone to cool for 10-15 minutes. Then remove all meat from the bone. Discard bone and any fat and waste.
- Place meat back into the cooker and finish cooking. This is a good point to taste test for adding salt if needed.
Recipe Notes
Pro Tips:
- Use a large crock pot of 6 quarts or above.
- Ham bones (and hams) vary a lot. So this is like many recipes, this is guidelines and not rules.
- If yours is honey-coated or spiced heavily, you need to rinse as much of that off as possible.
- Most hams have LOTS of salt. Don't add any until you're sure you need it and use low sodium products if possible.
- You can use pre-cooked navy or great northern beans. You will need 48 oz. and they should be drained and rinsed. Use low sodium is possible.
- Dried beans should have an overnight soak in water to decrease gas production.
- If you seem to have a fatty ham, cook then refrigerate to cool then skim the fat.
- If you don't have a ham bone, you can still make this soup with about two cups of diced ham and use chicken broth for the water.
- The total cooking time for the dry bean version is 10 hour and 8 hours using pre-cooked beans.
- Stores well refrigerated for 3-4 days. And will freeze well for 3-4 months.
- It is a good idea to cool this soup in the refrigerator and when cold, remove any fat on top.
Nutrition
Editor's Note: Originally Published December 13, 2014. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation.
Lynne
This soup is incredibly good. I soaked a pound of white peas to use and found 8 hrs on low to be perfect in my 6 qt. pot. It didn't need any more spice and the smokey flavour from my spiral ham gave it the right touch. After it was done I added about a tbsp. of potatoe starch to thicken it up a bit. My husband raved about it and I will definately be making this version again....thank so much
Terry
Hi Doc, love your site. I'm making ham and bean soup as I type. My recipe is very similar except I use chicken broth instead of water (or 4 cps broth 2 cps water) and don't soak the beans (I don't get the gas). I also add a teaspoon of thyme and rosemary and about 1/8 cup of ketchup and a teaspoon of red wine vinegar. Give it a try. Like you say recipes are guidelines, and I'm always tweaking recipes to my liking. I also am impressed with your recipe calculator so much I made my own excel spreadsheet to mimic it, I bet many don't know it's even there. Thanks for that and having recipes for us that don't have children at home anymore (retired folks).. and hate wasting food, nice. Wonderful job keep it up.
DrDan
Hi Terry,
Glad you are enjoying the site. It is a great hobby for me. I'm glad you saw the "guidelines" comment. That is something many people just don't understand about recipes. But I try to make them complete enough as written for most people.
You soup modifications sound great but watch the salt.
Thanks for the note.
Dan
Aliceyn
Our “funny” family story... I was a young single mom, granddaughter of farmers, dating the son of San Francisco socialites. We were served a ham dinner during one of the holidays. (from the honey baked stores). I was helping clean the kitchen and GASPED when my future mother in law put the bone (with MOST of the meat) in the trash. She looked up and realized that as a single working mom barely able to feed my 2 children- what she had done. She said, “oh dear, I had heard you make soup from bones...do you want this?” That “bone” fed my children for a week, THEN I made the navy bean soup. 34 years later my husband still looks forward to ham bone soup. His mother is still shocked and possibly a little proud of all the things I can do and no one else they know can...
Jodie Knop
DrDan
Thank you for this recipe. I am making it today (with the vegetables) It looks like the soup my husband’s Grandmother Millie always made, without the vegetables. She never used a recipe. He has wanted me to make this for a long time. It is a bland soup, but she had always put a bottle of ketchup, bottle of hot sauce, chopped purple onions, and brown sugar on the table. We would add what we wanted to our bowl. Can’t wait to eat!
Michel
I'm making this one..after reading many recipes.! Going to add leftover mash yam (about one)..at the last hour of cooking time
DrDan
Hi Michel,
Good touch with the yam. It should thicken some and add taste.
Dan
Cathrine Livingston
I have made this soup twice in the past 5 days and followed the recipe as posted, except I used chicken stock instead of plain water in the crock pot. I did not have to add any seasoning at the end and the ham provided enough salt to the soup. I did mash some of the beans as suggested in the recipe. My husband said it was fantastic!! Will add this to my permanent recipe book.
DrDan
Hi Cathrine,
Glad you like it. I have a ham coming this weekend and I think my wife is more excited for the soup.
Dan
Trudy
I have been cooking for over 60 years. I have made all kinds of soups, cooking many meals teaches one a lot of things. One thing for sure, I no longer soak beans, it is a waste of time, leaches out the vitamins, and slows the cooking of a meal. The fastest, easiest, and most economical is to wash thoroghly, sorting if necessary, and placing in an appropriate size container e.g. Stainless Steel covered 2 quart or larger. Ratio of beans to water 1:2. 1 cup beans, 2 cups of clean, filtered water. Cook on HIGH for five minutes, let sit for an hour. The beans if cooked enough, when you draw out a teaspoon of cooked beans and blow on them will split and curl the shell. Never, ever add anything to the water, other than the beans. If the beans are old they will need more cooking time, and willnot split their shell when you blow on them. Then While all that was going on I was busy chopping the veggies. The onion, celery, carrots, and peeling fresh garlic to crush later into the soup. I saute the veggies in EVOO (Extra Virgin Olive Oil) or EV Coconut Oil. This brings out the flavor and seals in the vitamins in the vegetables. Here you can add precooked Acorn Squash, Sweet Potatoes, etc. Herbs of choice can go here as well. Potatoes added to the soup will serve as a thickener. Also, as the soup cooks, mash some of the Beans to thicken it as well with the back of a large spoon or a bean masher. This creates a smoother texture, besides thickening it. Add the sauteed veggies, cooked beans, meat (like Ham or even a smoked spicy summer sausage cutup); next, add the homemade soup stock, bay leaf, a little salt, black ground pepper. All these hints makes the soup quick, tasty, digestible, and easy to ladle up. I usually cook it on High four hours, and low for 4-6 hours. Your nose will tell you when it is ready. Add picante sauce, zucchini, kale, etc. if you wish to have more nutrious spicy, veggie soup. The length of cooking at 600 minutes is off-putting. Hours is more palatable. e.g. 6-10 hours
Donna
I love this soup! I think it has great flavor exactly as it is written. I was thinking of using this recipe as a basis for split pea soup. Do you think it would work with split peas?
DrDan
Hi Donna,
I have never made a split pea soup but it seems to me it would. I would need to investigate a number of other recipes to be sure but it makes a ham broth and seems to have about the right composition. I know mostly they use chicken broth but the ham would be better taste wise. I might be a great soup.
Dan
Sandra Cullen
Started this recipe & have a time lapse between ending the 8 hr soaking of dry beans & actual time I will prepare crockpot due to having to make trip to grocery for veggies. Do soaked beans need to be refrigerated while awaiting crockpot? Is it ok to substitute a can of celery soup instead of celery rib since hate to purchase whole big bunch when only need one or two individual ribs?
DrDan
Skip the celery if you want. Like all soups, use what you have. I like to refrigerate the beans during soaking although many don't. I see a water nutrient mixture that bacteria can grow in.
Joann Colan
Rake through beans when they are DRY first before rinsing and cleaning with water. This way the beans won't stick together when combing for rocks, dirt clods, rotten or broken beans with skins off. I rinse and scrub several times to make sure they are clean before I cook.
Gillian
Oh My!!! Made this soup today and boy was it delicious. As with every dish I usually make, I start with a basic recipe and make it my own but I always give credit where credit is due. So the only changes I made were to use homemade chicken stock, fresh thyme, fresh garlic and fresh parsley. I also added about a half cup to three quarter cup of finely diced butternut squash because I love it in most of my soups as a natural, slightly sweet, thickener. Plus its another sneaky veggie my kid wouldn't eat otherwise. I threw in a couple diced potatoes at the end along with a tsp or so of seasoned salt. I'm very close to saying that this is now my absolute favorite bean soup. Thanks for sharing.
Pauly P in NC
Good think I like Celery in my soups!!
Are you sure there are to be TWO STALKS of celery as opposed to 2 RIBS?
I could not fit two stalks worth of celery in my 8 qt pot...I stopped at one stalk.
Admittedly, I did have a hefty ham bone, but....
Otherwise a wonderfully easy and delicious recipe...THANK YOU!!!
DrDan
Hi Pauly,
You caught me on the computer. We appear to have a terminology difference. When I grew up we called a rib of celery a stalk and what you call a stalk a bunch. I did a fast Google https://www.seattletimes.com/life/food-drink/celery-question-8212-whats-a-rib-vs-stalk/
I think I will keep my present terminology.
Have a good holiday season.
Dan
Mark
Ham bone is really cheap now. I might have to pick one up and give this one a try.
DrDan
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the note. I have a Honey Baked in the mail now for the weekend. So I'm doing this next week.
Dan
Marsha
Really good recipe! I followed your recipe and used the ingredients you suggested, using 4 carrots and 3 celery per my family's taste. Took 8 hours on low, after soaking the beans for about 8 hours. I actually kept the beans covered in the refrigerator for a couple of days before I cooked the soup today and they came out the very right consistency. I had to add more seasoning at the end but did not add any salt to this soup. Thank you! I will be trying more 😀
Robert
My ex wife made very good bean soup using smoked turkey (I'm a heart patient) but she also made dumplings using Bisquick. She made her soup on the stove and added the dumplings just before serving. This also added some thinking to the soup. She also add carrots and onions.
DrDan
Hi Robert,
Thanks for the note. I can see it now...
Dan
Jane Montello
Made the bean soup and it turned out great. My mom (who has passed away and left no written instructions) used her leftover bean soup to make baked beans. I have been unable to find such a recipe on the internet. Do you have one? I am going to try to adapt various baked bean recipes using the leftover soup, but would love to get your take on it. Thank you. Your site is wonderful for cooking for 2.
DrDan
Hi Jane, Thanks for the note. I have not heard of doing that. It seems like the liquid to bean ratio would be off but you could drain some. I guess I would drain the liquid, call the ham as bacon. then add the ketchup/BBQ sauce, onion and other things. Honestly, I have not found a baked bean recipe I really like. I find most of them way too sweet for my taste. The best I have had is at Marlowe's in Memphis but they don't publish their recipe.
Dan
Jennifer Szalach
Delicious! My husband and I absolutely loved this recipe, we will definitely be making this again!
Tammy
This is very good. I will never throw out a ham bone again.
DrDan
Hi Tammy
I grew up never wasting anything so tossing the hambone is just wrong.
Thanks so much for the note.
Dan
Nancy
Great recipe and similar to my own. I add a couple of small potatoes to absorb some of the salt. A jalapeño pepper also adds some great flavor and and little heat. I like my soup a little thicker and creamier, so I take about a half cup of soup, add a little milk and cornstarch and blend it together and return to soup to finish cooking. No salt is ever needed.
Laura
This was an excellent base recipe. I made a few seasoning modifications to suit our tastes and used a few more carrots, celery and onion. Delicious. Thank you. I didn't know where to start and this was perfect.
DrDan
Hi Laura,
Recipes are always just "guidelines" anyway. Great modifications.
Thanks for the note.
Dan
Shelia
this is close to the recipe I always use, but I add a can of tomatoes (and sometimes potato to thicken it some). I'm making this this weekend using my New Years Day hambone. Yum.
DrDan
Hi Shelia,
Thanks for the note. I have done this with the can of tomatoes and it adds a nice touch.
I think I need to keep some instant potatoes around for crockpot thickening emergencies.
Dan
Sarah
My crock pot isn't large enough, how would I adapt it to the stovetop?
DrDan
I haven't done a stovetop version for about 20 years so I'm not much help. I would say a stovetop version will probably cook much faster since low simmer on a stovetop is high plus a little in a crock pot. I would look at some other recipes.
Good luck,
Dan
Brittany
Wanted to give this 5/5 rating, could not find the place to eye it! Excellent recipe!
DrDan
Thanks Brittany,
The rating is by clicking a star in the recipe card area.
Dan
Susan Downey
Hi!
I found your recipe yesterday when I looked up recipes for ham and navy beans soups. I used a smoked pork hock and added 1 TBSP hand crushed Newfoundland Savory to the recipe.
It turned out Awesome! Not too salty and it had a great balance of flavours. I did not need to add any extra water as I have a crock pot with a lock down lid.
My husband enjoyed every bite!
DrDan
Hi Susan,
This is one of those recipes that just works and adapts to individual taste changes.
Thanks for the note.
Dan
Jennifer
On the soak or not-to-soak issue.
Soaking reduces the phytic acid content of the beans. Phytic acid is not denatured by cooking, only by water soak. I always soak oats and beans for this reason. You can look up the problems caused by too much phytic acid - but here is my personal story. We had oats (unsoaked) for breakfast almost every morning to save money one year. My otherwise healthy children (no sodas, no sugar in the house, very health conscious family) had 5 cavities and a ton of precavities by the end of the year. I figured out it was the oatmeal. Or rather, the phytic acid in the oatmeal. We stopped eating it so often, and when we do, I soak it overnight or use it in refrigerator oats with yogurt. My children have had zero cavities in the 4 years since that.
DrDan
The doctor in me says that you had calcium issues due to a large amount of chronic phytic acid intake. The occasional intake would not be much of an issue, but the ongoing phosphorous intake could well be the cause of a lot of calcium issues. You did excellent in figuring that one out. I have read more recipes recently suggesting not to soak but still I would. The old ways are the best ways some times.
Thanks for the note and reminding me of biochemistry from 40 yrs ago.
DrDan
Erica
Can't figure out why you would rinse off any honey coating or spices. The sweetness makes ham and bean soup good.
DrDan
To me, there is way too much sugar on many hams and anything you can do to get the salt decreased here is a good thing.
Dan