The split pea recipe is from Slow Cooker Revolution and the bread is a no-knead recipe I added some chopped garlic and Italian seasoning to.
The soup recipe calls for a ham hock which I tried once and found disgusting. Do not recommend. At all. I rarely use the ham steak, either. Rather I like split pea soup with crumbled bacon on top. You do it your way.
I like yellow split pea with orange carrots and green split pea with yellow carrots. You do it your way.
Split Pea Soup
2 onions, minced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil or bacon fat
1 1/2 tsp minced fresh thyme or 1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/8 tsp red pepper flakes
4 cups chicken or vegetable broth
3 cups water
1 pound split peas
4 carrots, peeled and diced
2 bay leaves
1 smoked ham hock, rinsed (Blech)
8 oz ham steak, diced (optional)
1 tbsp lemon juice
Microwave onions, garlic, oil, thyme and red pepper flakes in bowl about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until onions are softened. Transfer to slow cooker
Stir broth, water, split peas, carrots and bay leaves into slow cooker. Add ham hock (blech). Cover and cook until peas are tender, 9 to 11 hours on low, or 5 to 7 hours on high.
Remove ham hock and shred into bite size pieces, discarding skin and bones (blech)
Stir in ham steak and shredded ham hock. Cover and cook on high until heated through. Stir in lemon juice, season with salt and pepper to taste.
Garlic-Herb Bread
Seriously you should Google your own recipe because I kind of improvised this.
1 1/2 cups warm water
2 tsp yeast
2 tbsp sugar
3-4 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
3-4 garlic cloves, chopped
2 tsp Italian seasoning
Pour warm water into mixing bowl, add sugar and yeast. Stir and let sit for five minutes until frothy.
Start mixer with dough hook attachment, add flour until dough forms, add chopped garlic, seasoning and salt. Mix until dough just pulls away from sides of bowl. (You’re not supposed to handle this too much)
Scrape dough into olive-oil greased bowl. Cover with dish towel and let rise for… hours. Like I covered the bowl at 10 in the morning and left it until about 4 in the afternoon. Just leave it alone.
Preheat oven to 450. You can preheat the dutch oven inside the oven as well, I’m experimenting with different techniques. For this loaf, I didn’t preheat the dutch oven.
Punch dough down, push lightly into a loaf-shape on floured parchment paper. Lift the parchment paper and settle it and the dough into your dutch oven. Cover with dish towel and leave it while oven finishes preheating.
Cover dutch oven and cook for 30 minutes. Take off cover and cook another 5-10, depending how brown you like it. Lift out bread and parchment paper and let cool before slicing.