Easy Ham and Bean Soup that’s so full of flavor, you can’t stop at just one bowl. This soup is made in an Instant Pot with leftover ham, navy beans, and a simple combination of veggies and spices. The best part about this soup is how ham infuses the whole soup with its delicious flavors.
HAM AND BEAN SOUP
It’s amazing that such a simple soup can have such amazing flavors. Most of the flavors here comes from the best part, the ham. Using leftover ham in this bean soup actually infuses the soup with the flavors of the ham.
So if you glazed a ham for a holiday dinner, make this ham and bean soup with the leftovers. Whatever flavors you baked on the ham will transfer into the soup beautifully.
The main reason for the ham infusing so much flavor into the soup, is because it was cooked in an Instant Pot. Pressure cooking is a great method for infusing a lot of flavor into the dishes.
Besides infusing a lot of flavor into the soup, making it in the Instant Pot will speed up the process. The whole soup will take you less than an hour to make. I’m still amazed that you can get tender, soft beans by pressure cooking it for just about 30 minutes.
If you cooked ham on bone for the holidays, you can throw in the bone as well. Cut the meat off the bone and add the bone into the pot while sauteing the veggies. Then, simply die the meat that has been cut off the bone and add it to the soup as well. This bean soup will be amazing with or without the bone. This will just be a good way to utilize the bone instead of just tossing it away.
HOW TO MAKE HAM AND BEAN SOUP IN INSTANT POT
Start by preparing all your veggies and ham. Dice onions, celery, carrots, and ham. Peel garlic and set it all aside. Rinse the beans to get rid of any debris that might be in the bag and set aside to let it strain.
Set Instant Pot to saute and let it heat up. Add oil, onions, celery, and carrots and saute until veggies soften and start to golden. (If using ham bone, add ham bone to the pot.)
Press garlic and add it to the pot. Saute until fragrant.
Add diced ham, stir, and saute for a few minutes. Pour in beans, chicken broth, thyme, bay leaf, crushed red peppers, and salt. Don’t forget to taste to make sure you have enough salt.
Stir, close the lid and make sure it’s latched. Turn the valve to “SEAL” and set the Instant Pot to pressure cook on high pressure cook mode for 30 minutes.
Let it do a natural release for about 10 minutes and then do a quick release. Be careful opening the lid.
HOW TO MAKE HAM AND BEAN SOUP IN A SLOW COOKER
You can easily convert this recipe to a slow cooker by sauteing vegetables and ham on stovetop first and then transferring it into a slow cooker.
Preheat a medium pot over medium heat and add oil, onions, celery, and carrots and saute until veggies soften and start to golden. Press in garlic and saute until fragrant. Add diced ham, stir, and saute for a couple of minutes.
Transfer it all into a slow cooker. (Add ham bone if using.)
Add beans, chicken broth, thyme, bay leaf, crushed red peppers, and salt. Don’t forget to taste to make sure you have enough salt. Close the lid and set it to cook on LOW for 8-10 hours (until beans are tender).
HOW TO FREEZE HAM AND BEAN SOUP
When freezing any food, it’s important to cool it to room temperature as quickly as possible before freezing. Cooling it quickly and freezing it will extend its shelf life by giving less time for bacteria to grow.
To cool the soup, place the pot with soup into a larger container filled with ice and let it cool, stirring occasionally.
Once soup is cooled to room temperature, portion it into freezer zip-lock bags. Get the air out and seal. Label and date each bag and lay them flat on a cutting board. Place it in the freezer.
It’s easier to freeze soup in freezer bags because flat bags of frozen soup can be stacked easily. This will save you a lot of room.
Defrost ham and bean soup overnight, in the refrigerator.
SOME MORE SOUP RECIPES YOU WILL LOVE
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Ham and Bean Soup
This soup is made in an Instant Pot with leftover ham, navy beans, and a simple combination of veggies and spices.
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp canola oil
- 1 medium yellow onion
- 2 long celery ribs
- 2 medium carrots
- 4 cloves of garlic
- 1 1/2 cups diced ham use leftover holiday ham is available
- 1 lb dried navy beans
- 8 cups chicken broth
- 1 large bay leaf
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- 1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
- salt
- ham bone from leftover whole cooked ham OPTIONAL
Instructions
Dice onions, celery, carrots, and ham. Peel garlic and set it all aside.
Rinse the beans to get rid of any debris that might be in the bag and set aside to let it strain.
Set Instant Pot to SAUTE and let it heat up. Add oil, onions, celery, and carrots and saute until veggies soften and start to golden. (If using ham bone, add ham bone to the pot.)
Press garlic and add it to the pot. Saute until fragrant.
Add diced ham, stir, and saute for a few minutes. Pour in beans, chicken broth, thyme, bay leaf, crushed red peppers, and salt. Don’t forget to taste to make sure you have enough salt.
Stir, close the lid and make sure it’s latched. Turn the valve to “SEAL” and set the Instant Pot to pressure cook on high pressure cook mode for 30 minutes.
Let it do a natural release for about 10 minutes and then do a quick release. Be careful opening the lid.
NOTE: don't forget to discard the bay leaf and ham bone if using.
Recipe Notes
All images and text ©Lyubov Brooke for ©Will Cook For Smiles. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If using my posts in collections and features, please link back to this post for the recipe. Disclaimer: Nutrition information shown is not guaranteed to be 100% accurate as most ingredients and brands have a slight variation.
Carole from Carole's Chatter says
Hi there! I’m Carole from Carole’s Chatter. I think you do really super things with food. I wondered if you would like to join the group of bloggers who share their posts on a monthly basis via Food on Friday. I host this link up on the second Friday of each month. Every month there are a few different themes. This month they are Breakfast, Soups and Easter Food. If you would like to check it out just hop on over to Carole’s Chatter. We would all love to see you there. Cheers
Maria McBride says
delish! I made this soup for dinner tonight. I set the timer for 60 minutes, like suggested, and used dry beans. I definitely make this again. Even my mom loved it!
Rhonda Childress says
How much celery?
Rondi says
She said 2 ribs
LyubaB says
Thanks, Rodi! You are correct it’s 2 celery ribs!
Nicki says
You don’t say how much celery to use.
LAURA E CONANT says
I halved this recipe, thinking it would be too much for my small family of 3. Plus my husband is an anti soup kind of guy, but willing to eat whatever I put in front of him. I had a frozen ham bone from Christmas and some frozen left over ham, as well. I also had pork stock, which is basically the juice left over from making pork chops in the instant pot. I can’t get over how delicious this is! I used small white beans (I guess they were navy? or cannelloni?? and cooked for 30 minutes. I could see cooking longer but loved that the beans had just a little firmness still to them. I served it with rice, a staple in our house, and I mixed the left over with the left over rice and put in fridge. The next day it was more like a rice casserole and IT ROCKS!!! Seriously good. Oh, and my husband loved it, too. Had seconds, even though it was soup! Thank you so much!!
Catina says
How much celery? Have you ever added potatoes?
LyubaB says
Catina, It’s two stalks of celery. And I haven’t but I think it would be good!
Colleen says
If dried beans are used without soaking , 60 minutes is required to get beans totally cooked .
Also ; beans should be soaked overnight for slow cooker .
I make a version of this soup often (yesterday!) and 50 minutes was just shy of what was needed to get tender beans.
I leave celery stalks in 4 inch pieces to pull out later. We do not enjoy mushy celery.
Last thing: Add a large can of diced tomatoes!!! It adds a brightness to flavor. Delicious!
Parker says
Just finished the 30 minutes of instapot cooking as per the recipe. Colleen, you are so right. dried beans NOT cooked – it would be helpful if the recipe would be corrected. This is my first time to try to cook beans NOT soaked overnight.. I decided to read comments to see what I might have done wrong. No brainer – beans not cooked.
Carol says
I’ve done quite a bit of searching on Pinterest to find the right recipe for a flavorful navy bean and ham soup in the Instant Pot. I’ll be making this tomorrow for New Years Eve. Thank you for sharing this recipe, and for answering my questions about possibly freezing the finished soup to take to an elderly cousin for a few meals. I appreciate your post.
LyubaB says
Hi, Carol! I am glad you liked it!
Sandy S. says
Had beans and ham for supper tonight. First time I’ve ever tried my IP and they were delicious! I had to substitute a couple of things but they were great. Thanks for easy instructions.
LyubaB says
So glad you liked it! 🙂
Elizabeth N says
My family really loved this. I made it twice the week after Christmas (with my shiny new Instant Pot of course!), and its been on regular rotation since then. My bean-hating husband especially liked this.
LyubaB says
I am so glad you liked it, Elizabeth!
Miss Cindy says
I added a bit of bacon as I did not have as much ham as I thought. I also recommend one can of diced tomatoes for flavor and color. Also cooked for 60 minutes under pressure because I like a very tender bean. Thank you for this base recipe, tasted just like mom in Indiana used to make!
LyubaB says
So glad you liked it! 🙂
Elizabeth Nelson says
I made this twice now and this time I didn’t have carrots, I added bacon and ham, and only did 1/2 tsp of Thyme and cooked on high pressure for 70 minutes. Perfect!
LyubaB says
Glad you liked it 🙂
Lori S. says
Made per the recipe, except used 1 T fresh Thyme, and it turned out so great! It was my first Instant Pot recipe. My dried navy beans turned out soft and perfect in the 30 mins, despite my concern after reading others’ reviews. This is a keeper for me – thank you!
LyubaB says
So glad you liked it, Lori!
Nina E Mullen says
Made this tonight, beans at 30 minutes weren’t done. Next time I’ll use soup button, which is 45 minimum. Thyme I feel could be less too. But other than that, really delicious.
Sherri says
This is my go to ham and bean instant pot soup recipe. Delicious!
LyubaB says
I am so glad you like it!
Sandy says
This soup is delicious. I made a few changes as I had some ham bullion granules that I wanted to use so I used one packet, 1 chicken bouillon cube, 4 cups water and one 32 ounce carton of chicken broth. I used a ham steak and cubed it up. Soaked the beans while I was prepping vegetables. I used my Instant Pot and cooked high pressure for 35 minutes with a natural release. This recipe is a keeper.
LyubaB says
Sounds good 🙂