Soup beans
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Soup beans is a term common in the Southern United States, particularly the regions around the Appalachian Mountains. It refers to pinto or other brown dried beans cooked with smoked pork as flavoring.1 Soup beans are usually served with cornbread, greens, and potatoes and may be topped with raw chopped onions. Soup beans are considered a main course, but also serve as a side dish. In rural areas, where food was scarce during the winter, these dried beans were a staple food.
Soup Beans may also include Navy or Great Northern beans or a combination of brown and white beans.
Thin, crispy fried yellow cornbread cakes called hoecakes are generally served with a well-planned soup-bean supper.
Soup beans are such a staple during the winter that general stores, when they began carrying dried beans, carried 50 lb. bags alongside the typical 1, 2, & 5 lb. bags. Soup beans are often re-cooked as fried bean cakes, or made into mountain chili the next day. In the winter months, a pot of beans simmered on the stove of every house every day.1
Pinto beans, along with corn meal, represent an unusual connection between mountain and southwestern and Mexican cuisine.
1 ^ Sohn, Mark F. Appalachian Home Cooking History, Culture, & Recipes Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. 2005.
