Frugal Framnett

One of my favorite soups is lentil pea soup.

The beauty of this soup is it is not a Martha Stewartesque soup requiring 128 simple steps (each with 28 sub-steps) to make. Not only is it simple to make it is very good tasting and will help fill your belly on the cheap.

As is usual I make a large pot of this soup and eat on it for a number of days. The ingredient list is as follows:

• One bag of lentil peas
• Three or four stalks of celery
• Three or four carrots
• One or two medium onions
• One ham steak, if you can get one with a bone great!
• Salt, pepper (both cracked & whole peppercorns), bay leaves

The process:
Get a big pot out, rinse and wash the lentils. Pour the lentils into the big pot and add water (my recollection is six to eight cups of water per pound of lentils) and start to heat. Season to taste with black pepper, salt, and bay leaves. Remember, you can always add more seasoning to your bowl when you are eating the soup, so take it easy on the spicing. I usually toss in two or three medium bay leaves.

While the lentils are cooking dice the carrots, cut the celery into smallish pieces, and dice the onion place it into the pot and mix it up. Then get your hamsteak out and dice into small pieces and place it into the pot.

Then all you have to do is let it all cook for about two hours taking care to stir the pot every now and then. Do not use a high heat, medium or less, as if the heat is too high then the lentils will burn to the bottom of the pot.

When the lentils are starting to tenderize then the soup is ready. Fill a bowl and eat it with buttered (homemade) bread. You will find the lentils provide a lot of fiber and will fill you up for a long time.

Bon Appétit!