Yay, the weekend. (Well, I have one more class today first).

One thing I think I'm going to do is make some bean soup. I found a recipe in the old "Cooking for Two" (I think it's Betty Crocker? 1950s-ish, spiral bound, blue cover, illustrations by Charley Harper? (Yes, I realize I'm probably one of the few people who remembers a cookbook based on that fact)) It's for a version of the famous Senate Bean Soup, and while I have no delusions of going into politics, the recipe still sounds good.

The one sticking point was that the recipe calls for either hamhocks or salt pork. Neither of which is readily available in my town for some reason. And I can't see driving 1/2 hour to go to Kroger's for ham hocks. (Especially not on "Texas Sales Tax Free Weekend." You could not pay me to go to the malls this weekend, they're going to be mobbed with helicopter parents, Alpha moms, fussy elementary-school aged kids, and bored snarky teenagers)

But I found that my beloved Penzey's spices had a "ham soup base," so I ordered some in my last order, and it's sitting in my fridge, waiting to be tried out.

I hope it's good, because if it is, that means it will be so much easier to make tasty beans - most of the ham they sell now, if you cook it in with the beans like the old recipes say, it kind of becomes tasteless meat-cubes over the cooking time. So I prefer to put any meat into the beans at the end - but then you don't get the cooking flavor.

(And salt pork and bacon - I'm really not "doing" either of them any more. Even though I've learned it probably wasn't bacon that gave me that bad stomach upset last fall, still, I think just to be safe I probably better steer clear of fatty pork).

As always, I'll post a recipe if it's good. Especially since this "Senate bean soup" is a recipe-for-two (all the others I've seen make larger amounts, and while leftovers are nice, sometimes it does get to be a drag to eat the same thing every day for a week.)

I also might make a loaf of bread, I don't know. (Perhaps my desire to cook, like many other desires to do something useful and energetic, will drain away when I think about actually pulling out the mixing bowl and figuring out a place that's comfortable to stand at and knead - my counters are a bit high for that and my kitchen is too tiny for an island)