Garden Vegetable Soup

Summer abundance became winter sustenance through canning and drying. But during the growing season, mothers would take whatever the garden offered that day — tomatoes, beans, corn, potatoes, carrots, onions, whatever was ripe — and make vegetable soup. Add whatever scrap bone or piece of salt pork was available, and the result was a deeply flavored, variable, completely honest soup. Carried in mason jars to the field.

Ingredients

• Whatever vegetables you have: potatoes, tomatoes, corn, green beans, carrots, onions, celery — any combination
• 1 ham bone, ham hock, or piece of salt pork (optional but transformative)
• 6 cups water
• 1 can diced tomatoes or 2 fresh tomatoes
• 1 tsp salt (start here, adjust at the end)

Black pepper

• Fresh herbs from the garden: thyme, parsley, a bay leaf

Directions

1. If using a ham bone or ham hock, place in a large pot with cold water and bring to a boil.
2. Add all vegetables in order of how long they take: start with onions, carrots, and potatoes. Corn and tomatoes go in last.

Add tomatoes, herbs, salt, and pepper.

1. Simmer 30–40 minutes until all vegetables are completely tender.

Taste and adjust salt.

1. Remove bone and pull off any meat. Return meat to pot.
2. For the lunch pail: ladle into mason jars while very hot. The vegetables and broth keep well insulated for hours.

Notes

This recipe has no fixed ingredient list because mountain vegetable soup never did. Whatever the garden gave, the pot received. The soup was also a way to use up older vegetables before they spoiled — nothing was wasted. A ham bone was considered luxury; many versions were entirely vegetarian.