Yummy! It's Soup Day!

For as long as I have been cooking, I have loved making my own recipes up like a good many cooks. I'm always on the lookout  for healthy recipes that don't involve too much fuss, and this whole gluten free lifestyle is causing me to go back to experimentation. Here is one of the gluten free recipes I concocted today.

Kielbasa and Pinto Bean Soup

• 4 cups of water
• 2 tbsp broth base (Orrington Farms Broth Base is both gluten free and tasty)
• 1/2 onion
• 5 small cloves garlic
•  4 carrots
• 2 stalks of celery
• 2 cups of pinto beans
• 1 16 oz can of crushed tomatoes with jalapeños

• 1 smoked turkey kielbasa (Jenny-O is what I used)

1.  Soak the pinto beans overnight. You can always use the canned stuff if you're in a time crunch, but dried beans are preferable because you can cook them to exactly the consistency you want them.
2. Drain and rinse the beans. Pop them in the soup pot with the water and the broth base. Cook over low heat while you do the rest of the prep.
3. Chop the onions, garlic, celery and carrots and add that.
4. Cut the kielbasa into bite sized chunks. Toss it into the pot.
5. Simmer over medium/low heat until the beans are soft enough for your taste. Add a little water if the soup cooks down too much. It took an hour to get the soup to where I liked it. 

I'd guess this soup serves about eight. I'm going to try freezing it to see how well it keeps. If you try my recipe, please let me know how it works for you.