Fasolatha Recipe

Monica is having a Bean Soup Recipe party, which I think is such an awesome idea! She's asked everyone to post their favorite bean recipe and then she'll be posting links to each one. There are already several posted on her blog, Orthodox Mother's Digest. Check them out and join in!

Here's my favorite bean soup recipe. It's a fairly common one I think, I got mine from the sisters of the Annunciation monastery. It's very simple and delicious.

Fasolatha

Ingredients:

• 2 cups Northern beans
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 carrots, sliced
• 2-3 stalks of celery, sliced
• 1 can diced tomatoes
  
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 cup olive oil (or enough to make creamy)
• salt & pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Soak beans overnight.
2. Next day: boil beans until skin falls off (blow on to test)
3. Add remaining ingredients & cook, stirring frequently until creamy.

Note: The longer it sits the creamier it gets, so I try to have it ready several hours before supper time.

Another thing that is very helpful to me during Lent is having a separate cookbook for all my Lenten favorites. I have several Lenten cookbooks that have some terrific recipes in them but it seems like there are just certain ones I make repeatedly.

So I bought a blank cookbook and took all of my favorites from each one along with other Lenten recipes I picked up along the way and put them together in one cookbook. It really makes my life easier this time of year!

Here are some of the Lenten cookbooks that I use the most:

The Festive Fast by Akritas Publishing

Food for Paradise {A Meatless Cookbook} compiled by St. John the Russian Orthodox Church

A Lenten Cookbook for Orthodox Christians by St. Nectarios Press

I'll be posting more of my favorites later on this week (Joanna's Famous Chili recipe is next)! If you have any favorites I'd love to try them!