For Rich Ham And Bean Soup, Use This Cured Cut Of Meat

Meals like ham and bean soup are all about squeezing the most flavor out of a few basic parts. Homey and hearty, great ham and bean soups embrace their simplicity by eschewing tons of add-ins or spices, and doubling down on the meaty, smoky-sweet flavor of the ham. But to make it the best it can be, you can't just rely on any old piece of ham. You need something that is going to add richness and more complexity to account for the lack of other flavors, and for that, you need a ham hock.

If you aren't familiar, a ham hock is a cut of pork that comes from the pig's leg, where the shank meets the foot. It's not a very meaty cut, but that's not the point. Ham hocks are heavy on skin, bone, and fatty connective tissue, which are all rich in collagen, which is basically an all-purpose soup enhancer. It affects both texture and the taste of soups, thickening them and adding body, while also providing a fatty richness that lifts up all the other flavors in the recipe. Other types of ham and pork may bring some of that flavor, but you simply won't get the same comforting richness, and ham hocks tend to be quite cheap as well. While ham hocks are mostly bone and skin, they do still have some meat on them, which can be shredded into ham and bean soup easily after being slow-cooked in the broth. 

Ham hocks have one last thing going for them. They are usually prepared by being both cured and smoked, which adds salt and gives them a much more complex depth of flavor than your average piece of ham. The cured funk and smokiness are going to impart a lot more to a soup as the ham hock slowly simmers for hours, and having one ingredient that can add that much depth by itself is essential for such a simple recipe. That's also why if you can't find a ham hock, the best substitute for ham and bean soup isn't normal ham, but other cured pork like bacon or pancetta.

While a ham hock will get you 90% of the way to great ham and bean soup, there is one more addition you'll need to complement it. A ham hock brings salt, fat, smoke, and meat, but your soup will still be missing a bit of acid to balance it out. You could add ingredients like tomatoes or even a little tomato paste, but if you don't want to mess with the purity of your recipe too much, vinegar is the answer. Just a few dashes of apple cider vinegar at the end of cooking will balance out and wake up all those fatty, meaty flavors. You'll barely notice it's there, but you will notice how much better your ham and bean soup tastes.