Darrell wrote down his recipe for pea soup for a friend who purchased a picnic ham from us. Thought I'd share the instructions here:
Darrell's Pea Soup
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| Pigs in Blankets made with some of our Berkshire Breakfast Sausage links and pastry crust make a great accompaniment to pea soup! |
I’ve never written the recipe for pea soup down before, I’ve
always just made it. Unlike most pea
soups, I like some whole dried peas as well as split peas. When I make it, the batches are in increments
of pounds. A 1 pound batch has a pound
of whole peas and a pound of split peas, a 2 pound batch would have 2 pounds of
each, etc. Because I have a 25 quart
stock pot and a love of pea soup, I can make up to a 5 pound batch but I need
to have a good bit of ham and at least 2 ham bones (from previously baked hams)
for a batch that size. Pea soup also
freezes well; a few quarts of pea soup in the freezer are one of the
requirements for making it through the winter.
Making the soup
The whole peas need to be soaked
overnight. Pick them over, taking out
the any bad ones or any pea-sized pebbles that may have made it into the
bag. Put them into a pot and cover with
a couple inches of water. You can’t have
too much water; you can have too little.
Let stand overnight.
The next day, drain the peas and
cover with fresh water. If you have an
abundance of chicken stock on hand, use that instead – it builds a whole new
flavor layer in your peas. You should
have at least an inch of liquid above your peas. Bring it to a boil, then reduce heat and
simmer for about an hour or less, depending on how firm you’d like the peas in
the soup. Keep an eye on them and add
more water/stock if necessary.
Meanwhile, for each pound of
peas, take a medium sized onion and 2 or 3 large stalks of celery. Dice the onion and celery. Sweat the onions in a suitable amount of
olive oil, cooking oil or butter (depending on your preference) and when
they’ve started cooking a bit, add the celery
Cook until the celery is just getting tender. To this, add as much salt, pepper, and dried
thyme as you’d like for the batch of soup.
By adding the spices to the celery and onions, you’re getting them
incorporated into the fat which will carry them throughout the soup a little
better. I use about a teaspoon of salt,
¾ teaspoon of pepper, and about ¾ teaspoon of thyme. Sometimes I use a bit of dried oregano.
Put this mixture into your soup
pot (different than the pot in which you’re cooking the whole peas), along with
the split peas (no need to soak these), 2 quarts of water or chicken stock per
pound of peas, then add a couple cups of chopped carrots, the ham (along with
the bone if you have it), 1 bay leaf per pound of peas, and the cooked,
drained, whole peas. Bring this to a
boil, then reduce heat and simmer until it’s suitably done. The split peas should pretty much turn into a
puree and the whole peas will retain most of their structural integrity,
depending on how long you cooked them. I
like to leave them a bit al dente during their boil so that they retain their
shape and have a little tooth to them.
As the soup approaches doneness, taste it and adjust seasonings to your
preference. Take out the bone and strip
any residual meat from the bone (it has probably fallen off) and take out the
bay leaves.
At this point it is ready to
serve. Being Dutch, I think the perfect
accompaniment is a couple of good Pigs in a Blanket (Dutch Soul Food). For the truly decadent, you can finish the
soup by stirring a dollop of cream into it in the bowl. It doesn’t need it but worse things have been
done to Pea Soup.
Some people also like a couple
of potatoes in the pea soup, I don’t.
You can also substitute any good pork sausage for the ham.
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