For the second anniversary party at O Panier Local, we made a community-sized pot of garbure to offer to our friends and neighbors. Like all good soups, we started our garbure the day before the fête, and let it simmer slowly for hours. Yummy!
If you are not familiar with garbure, it is an emblematic dish of the Béarn, sort of like a cassoulet but more soup-like, without the tomatoes found in cassoulet and with a lot of seasonal veggies added. Cabbage and potatoes are a must, and root vegetables like turnips, carrots and rutabaga are often included. Depending on your budget, garbure can include a ham bone (from the famous jambon de Bayonne preferably), pork, sausages or duck confit. I like to make it with confit duck neck and gizzards. Check out this post (from 2011!) for a longer discussion of garbure.
Ingredients:
- 8 oz dried white beans (preferably those from Tarbes)
- 1 ham bone or 1 salted pork shank
- 2 bay leaves
- 1/2 bu thyme
- 1/2 cup duck fat
- 2 large onions
- 4 carrots
- 4 cloves garlic
- 1 small green or white cabbage
- 3 turnips
- 4 medium Yukon potatoes
- 1 leek
- 2 confit duck legs
- Salt and piment d’Espelette
Notes
These proportions are a bit approximate, so you can adjust to what and how much you have on hand. The main point is that the garbure should be hearty and rich with vegetables and white beans.
Preparation:
- Soak the white beans for least 24 hours in a lot of cold water.
- If using a salted pork shank, put it into a pan with enough cold water to cover, bring to a boil, boil 2 minutes, then drain, discarding the water.
- Drain the white beans, put into a large pot, cover with cold water to about 2 inches above the level of the beans. Add the ham bone or blanched salted pork shank. Add the bay leaves. Stem the thyme, save the leaved to the pot, tie the stems into a bundle with kitchen twine and add them to the pot. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat to a simmer and continue cooking until the beans are beginning to soften but are still a tough crunchy, about 2 hours depending on the quality of the beans. Cool.
- Peel the onions, garlic, carrots, turnips and rutabagas. Chop all roughly. Split and clean the leek, chop roughly. Quarter and core the cabbage, shred.
- In a large soup pot, melt the duck fat over medium heat. Add the onions, garlic, carrots, onion, thyme leaves and leeks. Sweat until the veggies begin to soften. Add the beans, the ham bone or shank and their cooking liquid to the pot. Add the cabbage, turnips and rutabaga. Add enough water so that the whole has a soup consistency. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat to a low simmer, cover and cook slowly for 2 hours.
- While the soup is cooking, peel the potatoes and cut into bite-sized pieces. Hold in cold water until ready to use. Remove the skin and bones from the duck confit and discard. Shred the duck meat.
- After 2 hours of cooking, add the potatoes and duck meat to the pot. Remove the ham bone or shank; for the bone, shred any ham remaining and return to the pot. For the shank, remove the bone and gristle, dice the skin, and meat, and return to the pot. Continue cooking until the beans are very tender and the potatoes are fully cooked. Better to over cook than under cook. If the potatoes or beans begin to disintegrate a bit, they will act to thicken the soup.
- Remove the bay leaves and the thyme stems. Season well with salt and piment d’Espelette. It is normal that there should be a bit of duck fat on the surface of the broth.
- Serve with crusty country bread and a hearty country wine, like a Madiran from the Béarn.