This recipe is really a two-fer in that it really is a dish created for using up leftover bean soup when you are sick of eating the same bean soup after multiple days (at least that’s why I made it).  It’s a dish that uses both tomato sauce and chicken stock (though vegetable stock would be fine), vegetables typical in soups, cooked beans, and hearty herbs to infuse the whole thing.

The leftover soup is then ladled into a an earthen casserole dish and slow cooked for several hours in a low temperature oven.  After that, you simply make the topping, crank the heat to brown the top and you are done!  Cooking it on low heat over a longer period of time allows the soup to really thicken into something resembling an actual baked bean dish.

I’ve been meaning to mention this as well.  If you find cooking dried beans or making braises too time consuming given your schedule, you can use a pressure cooker.  In a fraction of the time, you can achieve great results with dishes that typically take hours to cook.  It’s a fairly pricey investment…about $100 or so but if you like slow cooked meals and are always short on time, it might be a great thing to consider.  They are fairly easy and straight-forward to use as well.  Anyway, recipe and more pictures follow after the jump…

Ingredients:

1 Bag of dried white beans, cooked to package specifications with one bay leaf added

4-5 Bay leaves

2 Medium onions, coarsely chopped

2 Carrots sliced thinly

2 Celery sticks, sliced thinly

1 Parsnip, sliced thinly

5 Cloves of garlic, sliced thinly

1 Quart chicken or vegetable stock

1 Quart tomato sauce

Handful of fresh sage leaves

2 Sprigs of rosemary

Olive oil

Kosher salt and red pepper flakes

1 Cup fresh breadcrumbs

1 Cup freshly grated parmesan cheese

Instructions:

Make the soup:

• Cook the dried white beans to package specifications with one bay leaf added to the pot (usually about 1.5 hours).
• In the meantime, prepare the vegetables as indicated. Set aside in a large bowl.
• When the beans are finished, set pan aside. In another large pot, place olive to coat the bottom of the pot and add all vegetables except for the garlic and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes.
• Add the garlic and remaining bay leaves and cook another minute or so. Add 1 sprig of rosemary and a few of the sage leaves.
• Strain the beans and add them to the pot. Then, add the tomato sauce and stock to the pan.  Bring to a boil and then reduce heat to low/simmer.  Simmer 45 minutes to an hour.
• Remove the rosemary sprig and sage leaves from the pan. Drizzle a bit of olive oil over the top.  Taste and adjust seasoning with more salt and red pepper flakes to suit your tastes.

Eat the soup as is as a meal with some crusty bread, a salad, etc.

Make the Baked Beans:

• Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Take some leftover bean soup and ladle it into the earthen casserole dish.  Bake the beans for an hour or two, until the beans have reduced a bit and thickened to your liking.
• Once that is done, remove beans from the oven and increase the temperature to 450 degrees.
• Once the oven is preheated, add the breadcrumbs and parmesan over the top of the casserole dish. Dice a few sage leaves and about a teaspoon of rosemary and sprinkle the herbs over the top.
• Drizzle with a bit of olive oil and a touch of salt. Then sprinkle a bit of red pepper flakes over the top of everything.
• Bake in the oven until the top is well browned and crusty, about 10-15 minutes or so.

Remove from oven and allow to cool a bit, about 10 minutes.  This will allow the crust to harden a bit more.  Serve in bowls or on plates as a side dish with hot/warm.  This would pair well with lamb, beef, or duck.