Beans are quite popular in Greece. You can have them during summer but also during winter. Mix them with a traditional sausage though and you just can’t have them enough.
The most traditional food that you can have in Greece with beans is fasolada. Nevertheless, beans are used in a couple of combinations and can be eaten as a main or a mezze.
Sausages though are kind of different. Even if in Greece we have a variety of traditional sausages that you can find in small city, the combinations are limited. You can have a spetzofai or a make a nice combination with black beer but there are not many traditional recipes that easily come to my mind.
Mixing them with beans though was always the best way for greek mothers to have there children eat some legumes.
Thats how i came to learn the following recipe. Now in this case i dont have just any sausage, but the following is traditional Sujuki sausage which is widely consumed from the balkans to the middle east. My father was really fond of it and always liked to have couple of them if the quality was good.
What is Sujuk sausage?
Sujuk is a dry, spicy sausage which is eaten from the Balkans to the Middle East and Central Asia. It consists of ground meat, usually beef or lamb and the Turkish name has been adopted largely unmodified by other countries. In Greece, it is called “σουτζούκι”
If you do go to Greece,you will find it most of the times as a part of a mezze in local taverns. Some prefer it together with eggs or Saganaki.
Combine it with beer or ouzo and you will not be disappointed
Ingredients
- 500gr. dried beads “beads” soaked in the evening in cold water
- 400gr. village sausages * cut into thin slices
- 1 large onion in thin slices,
- 2 cloves of coarsely chopped garlic
- 1 green pepper
- 1-2 carrots
- 200gr. peeled and chopped tomatoes
- 1/3 cup chopped parsley
- 1 tsp. sweet thyme
- 1/3 cup olive oil
- Salt Pepper
Boil the beans and carrots in enough water until they are softened but without melting and about a cup of broth remains in the pot. Saute the sausages in a little oil until they turn a little brown. Take them out with a slotted spoon and set them aside.
Saute the onion, pepper, and garlic in the remaining oil until they wither. Add the tomato together with salt and pepper, parsley and thyme and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the beans along with their water and sausages and stir.
Transfer the food to a clay pan (pan) and bake in a preheated oven at 180 ° C for 35-40 minutes or until the sauce sets. If you want, you can light the kitchen grill a little at the end of cooking to make the food a little crusty on top. Serve the bean soup with a rich seasonal salad (mixed with cabbage or lettuce) and rustic bread.
