Sopa de Habas Conventual de Vigilia

Puebla, Angelopolis, the convent kitchens behind thick walls and high windows. This sopa de habas belongs to vigilia, the meatless Lenten table of the refectorio, where the portera watched what came in and the cook knew how to feed a house without breaking the rule of abstinence.

The defining ingredient is the dried haba, the broad bean brought through the Spanish pantry and adopted into Mexican convent cooking because it gives body without meat. You cook it until it collapses. Then you pasar por colador, press it through a strainer, because the texture matters. A blender can help, yes, but the colador decides whether the soup is conventual or just bean water.

Do not put pork lard in this version. This is vigilia. The old recipe books use the language of manteca, but for Lenten kitchens that meant manteca de aceite, olive oil, when the canon required no animal fat. The garlic is fried in that oil, the bread is fried in that oil, and the epazote reminds you this soup is not Spanish anymore. Old World haba and wheat bread, New World herb and Mexican clay on the table. Cada estado, su propia cocina, and Puebla's convents had their own discipline.

I have seen versions of this in Puebla recetarios where the instructions are almost rude from being so brief: cook, strain, fry, serve. They assumed the cook already knew. I don't assume that. I explain because saber cocinar es saber vivir.