With win­ter on the way — nev­er mind the sneak pre­view of snow in New York in late Octo­ber — the weath­er is per­fect for bean soup. By beans, I mean the whole fam­i­ly of legumes, includ­ing black beans, white beans, pin­to beans, split peas, and lentils. And there’s a lot to love:
• Beans are top for nutri­tion. They have more fiber than almost any oth­er food, are a meat­less source of pro­tein, and are rich in folic acid.
• They fill you up, not out. Dr. Bar­bara Rolls, author of The Ulti­mate Vol­u­met­rics Diet (April 2012), applauds beans for their low calo­rie den­si­ty and Penn State study par­tic­i­pants lost weight while eat­ing beans dai­ly because the beans help cut their hunger.
• Beans make an easy and afford­able meal or first course.

Here’s what you need to make Cook­ing by Num­ber bean soup to serve eight. You don’t have to trim the recipe if you’re serv­ing few­er peo­ple. Put the extra in sin­gle serve con­tain­ers, label, and freeze.

1 pound pack­aged beans (or two 15-ounce cans)
2 cups chopped onions and friends
3 peeled and coarse­ly chopped root veg­eta­bles
4 cups broth
Sea­son­ings

Here are some ingre­di­ent ideas to get you start­ed. Mix and match to cre­ate your own fla­vor com­bos.
Beans — Black beans, can­nelli­ni beans, brown lentils, red lentils, split peas
Onions and friends — Onion, gar­lic, shal­lot, leek
Root veg­gies Car­rot, pota­to, parsnip, turnip, sweet pota­to
Broth (reg­u­lar or low sodi­um) — Chick­en, veg­etable, beef, turkey
Sea­son­ings — Ital­ian blend, sal­sa, cilantro, smoked pep­per, herbes de Provence, bay leaf

Now that you’ve picked out ingre­di­ents, here’s what you do with them. I like to toss the beans, onions, broth, and sea­son­ings in the slow cook­er and let it do its thing. I add the root veg­gies about halfway through. You also can gen­tly sim­mer your soup in a pot on the stove until the beans are soft. (Soak pack­aged beans in room temp water for a cou­ple of hours to give them a head start.) For either cook­ing method, add extra broth or water as need­ed. Taste and adjust the sea­son­ing before serv­ing, if need­ed.