Jamaican Ham & Bean Soup

We had this for lunch after church today, with a tortilla chip recipe that I will post separately. I thought it would be really good, and it uses jerk seasoning, which I always have a lot of because I love Pampered Chef's Jamaican Jerk seasoning. I make these jerk chicken nachos with it that Steve and I just love, so I thought we would love this soup too. It's from the latest Simple & Delicious, Oct/Nov 2011. One thing I like about jerk seasoning, besides the taste, is that you get to say "jerk" a lot when you're cooking. When I was little, I thought "jerk" was the absolute worst thing you could call someone. So now whenever I make anything with jerk seasoning, I just laugh inside. I wonder who it's named after. Stuff like that. Also, do you guys remember that song "How Bizarre?" One of the lines goes "oooh baby, you're makin' me crazy." And this soup makes me think "Jamaican me crazy." If you want you can hum that song while you read this post.

Jamaican Ham & Bean Soup
1 tbsp canola oil
1 small onion, chopped
3 cups cubed fully cooked ham
2 cans (16 oz each) refried beans
1 can (14 1/2 oz) chicken broth
1 can (11 oz) Mexicorn, drained
1 can (7 oz) white or shoepeg corn, drained (I left out both of thse and used 2 cups of frozen corn)
1 can (4 oz) chopped green chilies
1/2 cup salsa
1 tsp Caribbean jerk seasoning
1 can (2 1/4 oz) sliced ripe olives, drained (I hate olives, so I left these out)
1/3 cup lime juice
Sour cream and lime slices, optional

Heat oil in Dutch oven; saute onion for 3-4 minutes or until tender. Stir in ham, refried beans, broth, corn, chilies, salsa, and jerk seasoning; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in olives and lime juice; heat through. Garnish each bowl with sour cream and lime slices if desired (we didn't).

Okay so this was really easy. The most time consuming part was cutting up the ham. Unfortunately, it wasn't a hit. I thought Steve would really like this. Everybody ate it, at least ate the ham and corn out of it, but nobody was like "Yum" or anything like that. So I am surprised. I thought it would taste better. We had it with the tortilla chips, which are featured on the same page in the magazine, and are suggested as a side to this soup, but I think the flavors didn't go together, which didn't help the soup at all. So not a keeper. Maybe you'll like it though.