Recipe for a Rainy Sunday

My Facebook post of this bubbling pot of Portuguese Soup generated a lot of attention yesterday, including some requests for the recipe. It is an ideal dish for chasing away the early spring never-ending winter chill, and since it’s snowing here — again — this morning, here goes.

I snipped the recipe out of the Cape Codder weekly newspaper probably 24 years ago. The yellowing clip says it was submitted by John Kearney, a Provincetown artist. I hadn’t made it in ages, and tweaked it here and there as I went along yesterday.

It turned out really yummy; can’t wait for another bowl for lunch today. Hope you like it, too.

Portuguese Soup or Kale Soup

1 lb. dried heirloom pebble beans (John’s recipe calls for 3/4 lb. dried kidney beans and 1/4 lb. dried white kidney beans)

1 1/2 lbs. chorizo sausage (John’s recipe calls for linguica) cut into 3/4-inch pieces

1 large potato, peeled and cut into cubes

1 large onion, diced

1 14-oz can chopped tomatoes (John’s recipe calls for an optional 2 fresh tomatoes, chopped)

1 container fresh baby kale, chopped (John’s recipe calls for 2 10-oz. pkgs frozen kale or 1 lb. fresh kale, chopped)

Chicken broth to cover (John uses water)

(John also adds 4 or 5 fresh mint leaves; I omitted those)

• Soak the beans overnight, then cook them until tender in fresh water.
• Saute the sausage lightly in a large soup pot.
• Add the potato chunks and onion. Saute a bit longer, until the onion is translucent.
• Add the tomatoes and broth.
• (Note: Cover with enough broth to make it soup-like. As this is more a stew, don’t add too much, just a little more than necessary to cover the ingredients. Then keep your eye on it; you may want to add more broth or water as the soup simmers.)
• Cook until potatoes are tender. Then add the kale.
• Cook for several hours … or until the house smells so good you simply cannot resist a bowl. If using mint leaves, add them at the end. This is especially good with crusty bread. The number of servings is not listed. I can promise it will not last long.