Theme Recipe: Grill Top White Limas With Ham Bone

This is pure Hurricane aftermath food!  When a hurricane knocked out our power for a month years ago down in Tallahassee, not only did we have to eat off the grill, we had to try to eat out of the freezer after the FEMA dry ice, well, dried up.  I made these one evening because there was a meaty ham bone in the freezer that was thawing out, as my Dad kept all the really sensitive stuff as close to the dry ice as possible (this also occasioned him the excuse to eat what was left of his birthday cake, which was an ice cream cake, for dinner one evening, with no excuses needed).  We had quite a lot of dried and canned goods set aside for hurricane season--but thought we had dodged a bullet, because it was November....not so.  Funnily enough the power came back on Nov. 30, the end of Hurricane season, and my birthday....  I have since made these a few times on the grill and love the smokey taste.  They are best cooked over charcoal that has wood infused and/or with soaked wood chips thrown on the hot coals.  They can be made on the stove or in the slow cooker, of course, but they will not have the same smokey flavor.  For the same meal, I also managed to cook a blackberry cobbler on the grill and was surprised how good that came out as well.  Just to give some idea what we go through down here every year, here's the list supplies we need to ride out a bad one.

This is easy, but if you are going make them on the grill, it has to be larger than a table top grill.  Set the charcoal alight and cover when the fire dies down and allow to sit for 10 minutes.  Have extra bricketts available to add more.  If you are using wood chips, then soak them for 40 minutes. 

1 1lb. bag large white lima beans (or any dried beans you like)

1 hambone, with some meat left on

Water to cover

1 tbsp. salt

Combine all these ingredients in a large pot and place on grill.  Add extra bricketts every 30 minutes.  If using wood chips drain well first, so that their soaking water doesn't put the fire out of the bricks.  This cooks in about 3 1/2 to 4 hours.  Check the salt level, if it's low add a bit more (check it first, ham is salty)

VARIATIONS:

As mentioned above, any type of dried bean can be used, and stock can replace water.

You can add herbs, dried or other wise.  Vegetable can be added in, and this is a good way to use up vegetables in the fridge that are a bit past their prime.

You can use a mixture a beans and other dried grain, like barley.

Leave out the meat and add some black or other type of pepper to make them vegetarian.  In this case, they benefit from having some tamari or other soy sauce added or vegetarian liquid smoke.  Braggs amino work really well.

It can be made with any type of smoke meat (or even smoked not meat products), if pork is not OK to eat.

Bon Apetite!