Ham Bone Broth Soup

This year around Easter my P.S. (Personal Shopper/ hubby) bought two different hams.  Lover of making bone broth that I am, I used each bone in turn to make a good pot of broth.  Eventually my fridge was full and I wanted to make a big pot of soup with the broth and vegetables.  I didn’t have a plan, I just used what I had in the fridge.  The result was the best soup, ever!  Ham bone broth rocks!

Ham Bone Broth Soup

Making the broth was simple, I used my usual method of throwing the bone into a pot and covering it with water.  I never add onion or other vegetables to the broth as I make it, I add them later for flavor in my soup.  I brought the pot to a boil over medium high heat then reduced the temperature to medium low and let it simmer for about 3 hours.  I let it cool then strained the broth before refrigerating it.

Cook ham in a large soup pot covered with water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 3-4 hours.

A week later when my P.S. brought home a second ham I repeated my process.  I now had 2 containers of broth.  If I hadn’t had the flu I’d have used the broth for soup immediately, but alas it would have to wait a week until I got my taste back.  Do you know how frustrating it is to cook when you can’t taste?  I’d already tried a few things and didn’t want to ruin a pot of lovely ham soup.

When I was finally ready to use up the bone broth by making a pot of soup I wanted it to be more vegetables and ham than my usual soup with beans or one with a cream sauce.  I started by pouring the containers of broth into a large soup pot.  I had about 16 cups of broth so this was going to be a big batch of soup.  I added minced garlic and let the broth come to a boil.

Strain broth and return to pot. Add minced garlic and bring to a boil. Add carrots, onion and celery. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to medium low. Simmer until carrots are just fork tender, about 20 minutes.

I cut up about 4 cups of sliced carrots and added them to the soup pot. Then I decided I wanted more carrots, as they’re my favorite part of a vegetable soup.  I cut up 2 more cups of carrots into sliced and added them to the pot.

Dice ham into smaller pieces, about 1″.

I used a large onion, dicing it up and adding it to the pot.  Usually I sauté the onion and celery for a soup first, but this time I was being lazy.  The vegetables all went into the pot and into the broth without any pre-cooking.  I chopped up the celery and added it to the broth, ending up with about a cup of celery.

Add potatoes and simmer another 15 minutes or until potatoes are fork tender.

I let the pot come to a boil, then reduced the meat to medium low and let it simmer for about 20 minutes.  The carrots were just fork tender.  I’d peeled and diced about 6 cups of potato which went into the pot next.  I would have liked more potato with such a big pot of soup but I didn’t have any more.   My fridge full of leftovers would come to my rescue.  I had both leftover angel hair pasta and white rice.  Both would be excellent in a vegetable soup!

Add corn, peas and ham to pot. Heat for 5 minutes or until heated through.

When the potatoes were fork tender, after about 15 minutes of simmering, I added 2 cups of frozen corn, 2 cups of frozen peas, the ham I’d chopped earlier, and let it heat for a few minutes.

Add pasta and rice and heat several minutes more. Taste test for seasoning, adding salt and black pepper to taste.

I finally added the leftover white rice and chopped up the angel hair pasta just a little to make it smaller and more manageable pieces.  I stirred the soup and let it heat through about 5 minutes, then taste tested for seasoning.  I added salt and black pepper until I was happy with my seasoning and the soup was ready to be served.

Ham Bone Broth Soup

This soup had such a great ham flavor from the ham bone broth it was absolutely amazing.  I just loved it!  I had my cousin Shirley over for lunch and she loved it as well.  It wasn’t a heavy soup like it sometimes is with beans added to it.  This was nice and light with the vegetables, rice and pasta.  I was happy that I’d made a large pot of soup and had leftovers for many meals.  This soup is worth eating over and over.  I’m looking forward to making more ham bone broth in the future!

What worked well was having the leftover pasta and rice.  I let the soup cool before I added them to the pot.  Then I refrigerated it overnight before serving it to Shirley and I for lunch.  The pasta and rice didn’t absorb all of the broth, as sometimes happens.  There was still a nice amount of broth in the soup.

Ham Bone Broth Soup

• Servings: 10-12 servings
• Difficulty: easy
• Print

Hearty ham bone broth makes a great background for ham and many different vegetables!

• ham bones with bits of ham left on (my yield was 16 cups)
• 1 teaspoon garlic; minced
• 1 cup onion; diced
• 1 cup celery; diced
• 6 cups carrots; sliced
• 6 cups potato; peeled and diced
• 2 cups corn; canned or frozen
• 2 cups peas; canned or frozen
• 2 cups ham; cubed
• 2 cups rice; cooked and chilled
• 4 cups angel hair pasta; cooked and chilled
• salt and black pepper to taste

Place ham bone in a large soup pot and fill with water to cover. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to medium low and simmer for 3-4 hours. Cool, strain and refrigerate broth until needed. I made the broth twice, with two different bones, which yielded about 16 cups (1 gallon).

Place broth in large soup pot, add garlic and bring to a boil. Add onion, celery and carrots. Reduce heat to medium low and simmer until carrots are barely fork tender, about 20 minutes.

Add potatoes and simmer for 20 more minutes. Stir in corn, peas and ham. Let cook several more minutes to heat through.

Add leftover rice and pasta. Taste test for seasoning, adding salt and pepper to taste. Heat for a few minutes and serve hot.