OK, what's everyone's problems with cooking dried beans??? I make some kind of bean soup every week though I usually use navy or pinto beans or both together. I rinse & check the beans for foreign matter, takes less than a minute. Then I cover the beans with water so that it's 2 inches over the beans. Bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer & cover. Takes about 2 1/2 hours to cook pintos, maybe half an hour less for navy beans. I never ever bothered with the soaking or boiling for 2 minutes and waiting an hour or any of that unnecessary stuff. (However, if you have gas problems from eating beans, it might help if you do that, as described by BugsNRoo.) And if you can't be bothered with or plain old just don't have time to cook dried beans, then just open some canned ones, rinse and drain them and stop whining. Wanda, you have been treated poorly! Thanks for sharing this great recipe!

4 stars because the recipe submitter forgot to add that you need to do some sort of soak before you use dried beans. Although I'm sure most home cooks know to do a soak! I did a quick soak first, where I covered the beans in water, brought to a boil, took off the heat, and let them sit covered for an hour. Then I drained the water and rinsed them and started cooking. I used ham hocks which helped flavor the soup, but I probably had much less ham in my soup than called for. That was my only change to the recipe. My husband loved the soup! I thought the sour cream gave it a nice creamy texture, and it felt good eating it on a cold day. It was simple and it didn't take a lot of time to make. I will be making this soup again in the future!

Taste was a 4, but I reduced it for hassle/time factor. I just think it would have been so much easier to open several cans of beans and add some spices. It looks innocently simple, but working with dried beans I think is just a pain. Beans will NOT cook by boiling and simmering for an hour or two. I have to boil them, soak them overnight, and then simmer them for quite some time the next day. My mother had to do this, my brother too. Are we the only three people who can't make dried beans ready in 2-3 hours? Or does everyone else just like hard beans? I know what boil and simmer mean, and this just doesn't work. And they'll never get by on 6 cups of water. I don't know how much I added but I lost count at about 11-12 cups. When the beans were about 3/4 done, I drained them and just covered in water, added the flavor packet and the ham itself to help add flavor. And then added water as needed to get a thickish soup that still had flavor. It was pretty good once it was done, which was a full day. (That doesn't include the time going through the beans, which I always do since I *have* found rocks in them.) I had doubts about the sour cream, but think it just made it better. But I won't be making again any time soon. There's plenty of easier bean soups out there.

This was good and full of protein. I omited the ham because I am not much of a meat eater. Still good.

This was okay, but I probably won't make it again. The color was not very appealing once I added the sour cream. I was looking for a comfort food type dish, but this didn't quite make it for me.

This was really good with homemade cornbread on a cold day.