Frugal Friday With Marsha—Great Northern Bean Soup

Welcome to the New Year! I am going to start Frugal Friday’s this year by sharing economical recipes.

My friend had treated me to an evening out to the Bluebird Bookstore for their test kitchen event.  At this event they highlight several of their cookbooks for sale by lettings us test a recipe or 2 from each book.  They also give us their review of each cookbook and then offer  20% discount for any cookbook we purchase that night.

One of the cookbooks was Good Food From Mrs. Sundberg’s Kitchen.  The recipe they shared was Great Northern Bean soup.  The lady rattled off the ingredients–2 cans of great northern beans, Ro-Tel, canned corn, and chicken, topped with shredded cheese. 

I didn’t end up buying that cookbook, but I did make the soup at home and will be making it again and again. This makes enough to feed several people or for several meals. I freeze the leftovers in individual serving size containers.

This is the ‘recipe’ that I use:

2 lb bag of Great Northern beans (cooked in the slow cooker with some salt, pepper, and garlic salt)
Once the beans are pretty well cooked I added 2 cans of Ro-Tel and one can of corn.
I then added 1 lb of cooked boneless chicken–cubed.

I didn’t put any liquid on the beans other than enough water for them to cook in.  I serve it with shredded cheese to top it.

This soup is SO good!

(My apologies for no photo! I forgot to take one, but will when I make it again and edit this post.)

My mom always gives me bags of beans from her government commodities foods.  I have (or had) an over stock of cans of Ro-Tel in the cabinet thanks to sales and coupons making them free.  I always stay pretty well stocked up on canned vegetables, also thanks to sales and coupons.  I buy the 3 lb bags of boneless skinless chicken breasts (preferably when they are on sale) and generally cook it all at once and then divide it into 3 parts in the freezer. 

I did want to buy the Good Food From Mrs. Sundberg’s Kitchen cookbook because it’s full of what I call every day foods recipes.  Those are the recipes that I want, recipes that call for every day items, not specially foods. Instead I chose to buy a Six Sister’s cookbook, for the same reason, plus is has 52 menu plans and other goodies included.

I am highlighting both cookbooks below.