Soup's On, Part VII: Half-and-Half Bean Soup

I made a great bean soup today that may be one of the best soups I've ever made.  I've never done a soup like this before, and it turned out so well!  I'm really excited about it.  What I did is make two types of blended bean soups, a darker one and a lighter one, and served them in the same bowl, next to each other.  It was a time-consuming process because I used dried beans, but it required very little actual work, as most of the time is spent soaking or boiling the beans.  Even the fact that I was essentially making two soups didn't make it that hard because I just did the two at the same exact time with many of the same ingredients.

I used some of my fabulous Rancho Gordo beans.  The two I chose were Yellow Eye beans, which are a white bean with a yellow "eye" (not unlike blackeyed peas, but light yellow) for the light side; and huge, beefy, dark-colored Scarlet Runner beans for the dark side.  Canned beans would work fine, too, and other types of dried beans, as long as you have a white or light-colored bean for one side and a black or dark-colored one for the other.

After soaking the beans overnight and draining them, I cooked them each in separate pots with aromatics, just like you would for any other dried bean prep.  They each got a couple peppercorns, a bay leaf, a garlic clove, a piece of carrot, and onion.  The Scarlett Runners also got a whole dried chile.  They got boiled until they were fully cooked, then drained, the pot liquor reserved, and the bits of bay leaf, carrot, etc. picked out.

I made each soup essentially the same but with different flavors.  For the dark bean soup, I sauteed minced garlic in a mix of canola and olive oil with some chopped roasted chiles that I had roasted back in the fall during chile season and then put in my freezer; it makes using fresh roasted chiles easy throughout the winter.  I added in the beans and about equal portions of veggie stock and the Scarlett Runner pot liquor.  I then added in salt, pepper, and a little chile powder.

For the lighter side, I sauteed minced garlic in just canola oil and like the first soup, added the beans and equal parts veggie stock and the Yellow Eye pot liquor.  I wanted to keep the color light, so I made sure to not mix any of the black Scarlett Runner pot liquor into the light-side soup.  I didn't use roasted chiles for that side; instead I used a little ground green chile powder and several grinds of white peppercorns.  I also added some coriander and cumin, and of course salt.

Each soup got blended with an immersion blender and then thickened a little with some corn starch.  To make the half-and-half look, you cut a paper plate to the shape of the bowl, or use a thin plastic cutting board, or whatever works.  It has to be thin and flexible and fit the shape of the bottom of the bowl.  You just hold it in the bowl and spoon each soup into one side of the bowl.  Remove it, and you have half-and-half soup!  You can swirl the soups together with a toothpick, straw, or other thin thing to make it interesting. 

The light side soup was milder, whereas the dark side was smoky and spicy.  Each one is delicious alone, but a spoonful of a little of each was perfect.  It really worked well, which I was thrilled about since I'd never even done it before.  I'm really happy with my creation!  There's plenty of each left over, too, so we'll have some for yummy leftovers all weekend.

The fact that this soup is super cheap makes the whole thing even better.

Happy eating!