Green Tomato Soup

I always use the end of the tomatoes from my garden for this, so we really only get to make one pot a year. It's probably about 2 1/2 - 3 lbs of tomatoes.

Lots of tomatoes - ripe, unripe, anything in between

Hamhock or smoked pork shank

1/2 Stick of Butter

Peppered Bacon (2 or 3 slices)

Fresh Chard (5 or so large leaves)

Wilt the Chard in a frying pan with the bacon. When the chard is totally wilted, separate it from the bacon. Chop up your bacon and throw it in the soup pot, set the chard aside.

Saute the hamhock/pork shank in the butter. (You don't need to worry about cooking these pieces through, they're already cooked, but you'll want to cook off some of the fat.) Pour the drippings into your soup pot. Clean the meat off of your ham pieces. Throw out the skin and keep the bone for other soup.

Chop up the tomatoes and throw them all in your soup pot. Cook until tomatoes break down and the soup starts to take on the consistency of a sauce. When you're happy with the consistency of your soup, stir in the chard. Adding the chard at the end prevents it from cooking down to nothing and disappearing into the soup.

Enjoy! With Peppered Bacon, you likely will not even need to add salt and pepper.