Cabbage Soup

I love my slow cooker - I can set it up in the morning, ignore it all day, and sit down to a hearty dinner in the cool of the evening. It's almost like having a private chef.

The other day I used it to make this cabbage soup. While I would never boil cabbage on the stove - the smell would linger for days apart from anything else - cooked gently in the slow cooker over many hours it becomes soft and tender, nothing like boiled cabbage.

I added protein in the form of white lima beans that I had cooked ahead - they only take a couple of hours simmering on the stove. I used 1/2 cup of beans to make the 1 1/2 cups cooked beans the recipe calls for. A 14 oz can of cannellini beans, drained, would work too. The color in the soup comes from the carrots. Also, I added a little red cabbage too because I had it in the fridge. By the time the soup was cooked, it was all pretty uniformly white.

The keys to the great flavor in this soup are the vegetable stock and the liquid smoke. I'm not sure what liquid smoke is, the ingredient is smoke, but I feel it's comparatively natural. And it adds the smoky, dare I say bacon-y, flavor that is traditional in a cabbage soup. Other smoky possibilities, if you prefer not to use liquid smoke, are smoked paprika or chipotles in adobo - which would add a bit of a kick too.

Cabbage Soup
2 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 carrot, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
5 cups shredded cabbage (1 small head)
1 potato, peeled and diced
1 1/2 cups cooked white beans
6 cups vegetable stock
4 sprigs thyme
salt and pepper
1 tsp liquid smoke

Sauté the onion, carrot and garlic in the olive oil until softened, about 5 minutes. Scrape into a 5-6-quart slow cooker. Add the cabbage, potato, beans, vegetable stock, thyme, and a good sprinkling of salt and pepper. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours.

Just before serving, stir in the liquid smoke. Adjust seasonings to taste and serve.

Serves 6-8. Freezes well.

The finished soup.