We’re ba-ack! With black bean, corn and okra soup

We’re back! After a long hiatus from writing recipes for this blog, it’s almost summer and we have more time again to cook and write. So, with no further ado, this week’s challenge is cooking from things left over in our house. The task: How many meals can we cook from miscellaneous things already in our kitchen without going grocery shopping? I was feeling creative last Friday and so I scoured around and made a list of 17 main dishes, 9 starch-y side dishes, and 5 vegetable side dishes, and this week we’ll be picking and choosing from the list. Today is black bean, corn and okra soup and home made corn bread from scratch. Here are the recipes:

Black bean, corn, and okra soup
Ingredients:
Spice mix:
1 1/2 teaspoon each: ground coriander, ground sweet or smoked paprika, ground cumin seed.
1 teaspoon (or less, if you’re not one for spice) ground cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon each: dried thyme, crushed bay leaves (or 1 whole bay leaf and then remember to take it out at the end)
Broth:
1 cup tomato sauce
3-4 cups chicken broth/stock
8+oz beer
Vegetables:
2 cans black beans
1 bag frozen corn
1 bag of frozen okra, sliced
1 whole diced onion
4 cloves chopped fresh garlic (or 2 tablespoons jarred garlic)
Misc:
1/2 – 1 cup orzo, large cous cous, or cooked rice (optional, mostly for bulk and texture)
1 tablespoon olive or cooking oil.

Directions:
Dice onion and sauté in the bottom of a soup pot in the oil for 3-4 minutes. Mix together spices while onion is softening. Add garlic and spices and continue to sauté for another 3 minutes. Add tomato sauce, chicken broth and beer. Bring to a boil, and then simmer covered for about 10 minutes. Add corn, okra and black beans. Cover and simmer for another 10 minutes. Add orzo, cous cous or cooked rice (optional). Simmer until orzo or cous cous is cooked, or rice is heated through. Serve with corn bread or whole grain bread for dipping.

Homemade Corn Bread
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup each: coarse ground corn meal (or polenta), all purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
5 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup cooking oil
2 medium eggs

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Mix together dry ingredients in large mixing bowl. Mix together wet ingredients in a separate mixing bowl. Add wet ingredients to dry and mix well. Pour into 8×8 in baking pan. Bake in preheated oven for 25-35 minutes. Bread is done cooking when a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean.