Slow Cooked Split Pea Soup [RECIPE]

Several years ago, forecasters were calling for a nasty blizzard and my boss said my husband and I (my husband and I used to work together) had to go to work and stay there in case we got nailed with snow and the community needed to be kept in the loop.

I had no idea how long we might be stuck at work, but I knew I'd need to eat and so I dug through my pantry and pulled out what I had and what I had turned out to be ingredients for split pea soup. I packed up everything, grabbed my slow cooker and headed off to work.

We ended up being snowed in for almost three days and grabbing ingredients to make split pea soup was the best decision I could have made because it not only fed me and my husband, but one other guy for those days, and it also warmed us from head to toe.

If you've been looking for a split pea soup recipe that is easy to throw together and that can cook while you're at work, you're in luck. I've adapted this recipe from Taste of Home and can be frozen if you want to double the recipe so that you'll have soup handy for those exceptionally cold winter days.

Ingredients
1 ham bone or 2 or 3 ham steaks, cubed
1 16 ounce package of dried green split peas
2 cups of potatoes, peeled and cubed. Any type will work.
1 large onion, chopped
3 medium carrots, chopped
Dash of garlic powder
Dash of dried thyme
Dash of dried basil
6 cups of chicken broth, reduced sodium is best since the ham is salty.

Directions
Combine all of your ingredients into the slow cooker and cook, covered, on low for 7-9 hours or until the peas are nice and tender.

If you've used a ham bone, remove it from the soup once it's cooked enough to touch and remove the meat from the bone. Throw the bone away and cut and cube the meat and add it back into the soup.