With a turn of the nice spring weather back to our typical cold and rainy weather it made for a soup kind of weekend.  Which gives me my favorite type of soup for a crock pot. As with everything I cook I tend to customize it to my tastes.  Which actually is probably true of most people who make the same recipe multiple times. Most of the ingredients that I use can have something simaler substituted in.  The only one that would be hard to change out is the mushroom powder that i make myself.

ingredients:

• 1 cup tongue of fire bean
• 1 cup calypso bean
• 1 medium ham hock
• 2 chicken bullion cubes
• 1 tablespoon mushroom powder
• 1/2 large sweet onions
• 1 cup wild mushrooms
• 1 tablespoon granulated garlic
• enough water to cover beans

Any wild mushroom will work for this recipe.  Porcini (king Bolete) will give it a deeper earthier taste then chanterelle or any of the other fall mushrooms.  If I could ever find some morels I would give those a try.  To start you will need to soak the beans over night in water to rehydrate them.  Both of these varieties of beans will more than double in size after soaking.  After they are rehydrated put all of the ingredients into your crock pot and cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours. Keep an eye on the water level through out the cooking period.  If the beans are not fully hydrated they will absorb all the water you had in the pot.