Slow Cooker Chipotle Black Bean Soup
This recipe was adapted from Basically Black Bean Soup from Bon Appetit. I soaked the beans, added and changed a few things and modified it to a slow cooker so that I didn’t have to babysit it. This is great served with cornbread, tortilla chips, quesadillas, or grilled cheese sandwiches, with a salad, veggies or even fruits like mango and watermelon. Another bonus is that this soup tastes even better a day or two later. You may just need to add a little bit of water when you reheat it.
Servings: 6
Ingredients
Soup
- 1 lb dried black beans soaked overnight in refrigerator
- 1 medium onion chopped (about 1 cup)
- 1-2 small to medium carrots diced (about 1 cup)
- 1 sweet red, yellow or orange bell pepper diced (about 1 cup)
- 3 garlic cloves smashed and roughly chopped
- 2 T extra virgin olive oil
- ¼ cup red wine vinegar
- 2 T chipotle chilies in adobo* with sauce chopped (or you can use 1-2T of hot sauce)
- 1 ½ tsp dried oregano
- ½ tsp cumin
- 1 ½ tsp Kosher salt
- 1 bay leaf
- 6 cups water
Toppings
- Lime wedges
- Avocado
- Sour cream or plain yogurt
- Chopped green onion
- Quartered cherry tomatoes
- Chopped cilantro
Instructions
- The night before: Place 1 lb of beans in a bowl and add enough water so that there is at least three inches above the beans. Don’t cheat on this. Really! The beans will absorb the water. Put the bowl in the refrigerator until ready to use.
- Chop the onions, carrots and peppers into similar sized pieces. Smash the whole garlic cloves with the flat side of a large knife. That should dislodge the skins so you can easily peel them off. If the pieces are very large, you can roughly chop them. Have the spices ready. Remove the beans from the fridge. Rinse, drain, and set aside.
- Heat the 2 T of olive oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add the onion, carrot, pepper and garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are soft. This should take about 5-7 minutes. When the vegetables look about done, add the ½ tsp of cumin and cook until the aroma starts to come from it.
- Add the ¼ red wine vinegar to the vegetable mixture and stir, scraping the brown bits off the bottom of the pan. Cook until the vinegar is reduced to approximately half the beginning amount.
- Add the 2 T adobo mixture, 1 ½ tsp oregano and 1 ½ tsp salt. Stir to combine and remove from the heat.
- Place black beans in the crock of the slow cooker. Add the vegetable mixture, bay leaf and 6 cups of water. Cook on high for 4 hours and switch to low for an additional 2 hours. Check the consistency then and cook for more time if desired. (On either low or high.) If the soup finishes before you are ready to eat, switch the slow cooker to the warm setting if it has it.
- If desired, use an immersion blender to puree part of the soup. This helps to add creaminess. Taste for seasonings. Serve immediately with garnishes or transfer to a glass container to cool and refrigerate for later use.
Notes
* Chipotle chiles in adobo are usually available in a 7 oz can in the international section of the store or near where the Mexican items are. You will not need the whole can for this recipe. I usually take 1-2 small chilis and chop them and then add the sauce from the can to make 2 T in total. Feel free to adjust to your family’s tastes. You can always add more heat but you can’t take it away! For the leftover chilis and sauce, I freeze them in approximately 2 T serving sizes in ziploc bags for later use. (You can use ice cube trays for this as well. Place the chilis and sauce in each hole, freeze until firm, and then pop them out and place in a ziploc or container. Just note that they may color the trays and leave behind some flavor, so it is good to have a “food” ice cube tray or two if you do that if you don’t want chipotle flavored drinks! You can use the tray for pesto, pizza sauce, tomato paste and other items that you may not use all of with one recipe but can be good to have portioned out in the freezer for later use.)