Getting Ready to Make Turkey Soup and Pressure Can Black Beans

Since we ate up all the chicken soup before I could can it, I decided to make turkey soup this week.

I bought an organic turkey, just under ten pounds, and baked it with lots of spices – garlic salt, cumin, red pepper flakes, chili powder. I poured olive oil over it, and placed it in the pan, breast side down. I added water to give it more moisture.

It took about two and a half hours to cook until the juices ran clear.

While the turkey was baking, I took a pot of black beans I had already soaked and cooked out of the refrigerator. To flavor them in the jars, I filled pint canning jars half full with black beans, then added a quarter slice of bacon, fresh chopped onions and celery, then filled the jar with more black beans.

Since I have three more pints left to go and I prefer to fill the canner, I made mushroom – sausage dressing with onions and celery, then added a quart of broccoli and a quart of asparagus which I canned last fall, to turn it into soup. One chipotle pepper adds a bit of heat to the flavor. I cooked a pot of “bean threads” pasta to complete the soup.
(Instead of pasta made of wheat flour, I buy “bean threads” made with green bean flour at the Asian grocery store.)

Now that the first batch of eight pints of black beans is done, I have added the three pints I have left and filled the canner with mushroom-sausage-vegetable-pasta soup.

© 2014 Kathryn Hardage