Absolutely delicious!!! I've always made split pea with my leftover spiral ham bone, but I thought I'd try something different. This will be my first choice from now on. The flavor is amazing. Even though this is an all day soup, it is well worth it. I too was afraid of my beans breaking down, but they held together nicely. I cooked my soup for 6.5 hours and it was fantastic. It started getting thick towards the end, so this is where ones opinion comes into play on time. I felt that if I cooked the soup for the additional time, that it would become more of a stew. EXCELLENT recipe...thank you.

Reviewed On: Nov. 7, 2009

I'll give this recipe 5 stars even though my pie didn't turn out. I don't want to mar this recipes reputation because my plums were not suffice. This is more of an "advice" than a "review". I received my half of brown bag full of plums from a neighbor and decided that because I hate to waste food, I'd try to put them to good use. Well about 7 of the bag were the size of an apricot and the rest were the size of a bing cherry. They were all over-ripe so I thought that I'd give this recipe a go because most reviews requested very ripe. Long story short, the skin of the plum is what gives it the rhubarby flavor.....tangy. The meat of the plum and the sugar gives it the....sweet. In this case, because the plums were so small, there was way more skin and not enough meat. Therefore it was extremely tart. I LOVE rhubarb pie and I could definitely taste the resemblence, but mine was over tart because of the sorry plums. I even threw a hand full of fresh blueberries in and added a little more sugar because I knew this would be the case......still didn't work. Now I'm wondering how unhappy the tree is that this fruit came from. In my opinion....if someone offers you fruit, ask if you can pick it yourself. They'll be happy to not have to do the work and you can choose or judge if you'd like any at all. By the way, I will definitely do this recipe again!!!!

Reviewed On: Jun. 17, 2009

Excellent!!! Although....I couldn't help myself....I wrapped them in bacon before I cooked them in the skillet. YUM! I cooked the bacon half way through (stove or a couple minutes in the micro). I use the platter bacon from the butcher at the grocery store....much better than the packaged stuff if you ask me. Adhered them with toothpicks (don't forget to take them out before serving. I also used garlic powder instead of minced because I was in a hurry. I'm a diehard when it comes to garlic, but the powder was absolutely fine. VERY TASTEY!!!

Reviewed On: Feb. 3, 2009