Beans, Beans good for the heart

One of my go-to quick dinners is a can of chickpeas, a bag of heat and eat wild rice, and some feta cheese if I have some. Toss with a little olive oil and I usually season with za'atar and red pepper flakes. Just be sure and rinse the chickpeas really well. Really, since beans can take on so much flavor, I often just open a can of beans, heat a bag of rice, and season with whatever sounds good. Throw some frozen veg on top and microwave again and dinner is done!

I like beans a lot. They have protein and fiber and are delicious. Dried beans in bulk are also very affordable, and they keep in the pantry a long time. I don't cook them in the summer; I don't cook much anything in the summer. No air conditioning, and I don't like to heat up the house.

When the weather cools, I make a lot of beans. I primarily cycle through black beans, garbanzo beans, and mayocoba beans (a.k.a. canary beans, a.k.a. peruano beans, a.k.a Peruvian yellow beans). The mayocoba beans are a little like pinto beans, but they are way more creamy. I have some aduki beans I cook from time to time. Very occasionally I'll do pintos. I also cook black-eyed peas, especially around the new year. I also like to cook split peas and different kinds of lentils; both pulses, but not beans. I've got black beans cooking right now. I will use some to make an improvised bean salad and turn the rest into a bean soup.

So many ways to cook them. I was on a kick for a while where I would sprout my beans before cooking. Soak overnight, then drain/rinse. Then I'd rinse/drain twice a day (morning and evening) for a few days until the acrospire was just barely starting to be visible. I got to know how long that took for various beans, and then I'd stop right before it was visible. Allegedly, sprouted beans are easier to digest and the sprouting process makes some nutrients more bio-available. The price you pay is that some of the protein is used up in the sprouting process, and the repeated rinsing can also take away some of the subtle flavors.

If I don't sprout, I just soak overnight. A few decades ago, I used to soak for a couple days changing the water twice a day. Some say it makes them "more digestible." They mean they make you fart less. After you eat beans on the regular, you don't fart so much. And who doesn't like a good fart now and then anyway.

Basic cooking is simple. I salt my cooking water. Some people claim that your beans will never get tender. They are wrong. What happens is the salt gets into the beans and they taste better. If you just salt the water after they're cooked, you have cooked beans in salt water. I always add a few leaves from the Oregon Bay Laurel in my yard. Most people just us dried bay leaves. I usually toss in some kind of hot chile, like today I added a whole chile de arbol. I add a lot of cumin to black beans and a little to other kinds. Not a bad idea to toss in a broken up chunk of celery, maybe a carrot, and maybe some onion or garlic. Or not. But if you do, you get a lot of flavor in the beans and cooking water. Serve over rice for an easy meal. A big batch of beans will last for days.

For garbanzos you can soak them overnight and NOT cook them then grind up in the food processor with garlic, parsley and some other ingredients and you have the raw material for falafel. Or you can cook them and mix them with garlic and tahini and you've got hummus. I saw a couple recipes for roasted cauliflower and garbanzo stew, and I made a variation from them that's pretty darn good. Cook the garbanzos as normal. Bust up a cauliflower, toss with spices like dry mustard, curry powder, cumin, salt, pepper, and lots of ginger. Roast in a 425 degree oven until they start to get a little black. Mix with the beans, a bunch of fresh ginger, a whole lot of garlic, and some crushed tomatoes and tomato paste, then put in a Dutch Oven and either bake or simmer until it's so delicious you can't stand it.

For bean soup, and I really love black bean soup, I first start cook some beans. While they cook, I saute what's essentially a mirepoix (celery, onion, carrot) and then add other vegetables and lots of garlic. More garlic. Love the stuff. Mix in the vegetables to the beans and let them finish cooking until just soft. Get a slotted spoon and pull out some of the beans and vegetables. Use an immersion blender to puree everything that's left in the pot, then mix in the beans and vegetables you pulled out for texture. Delicious. If you don't have an immersion blender, you can blend batches in a regular blender. Be careful; that soup is hot!

I did a garbanzo soup a couple days ago with some garbanzos that were left from a garbanzo salad. I pureed the whole thing - cooking water and all. I roasted a cauliflower that day, and I took the smaller pieces and just tossed them into the puree. It gave it a very nice flavor and texture.

For a bean salad, be careful not to overcook the beans so they stay whole and don't turn to mush. When they have cooled, mix them with thinly sliced red onion, shallot, celery, cumin, salt, olive oil, vinegar and black pepper. Toss. It's best if you let that sit overnight for the flavors to meld. If not, add the rest of the ingredients, but you'll be happier if you wait. Before serving, add chopped parsley and if you like it a diced English cucumber. Last time I made it I chopped up some green olives too. I am going to make some with the black beans that are now done cooking today. I am going to dice some locally made halloumi-style cheese that my friend dropped off. Add anything you think would be good.

Split pea soup can't be beat, and is really easy. There's a half a zillion recipes. Basically just boil 'em with spices and seasonings and that's it. You can puree.

Lentils... Yeah. Those. I made a dish last week that was brown basmati rice cooked with lentils. It was really good. I made another dish that was green split peas and lentils served OVER rice. The lentils cook a lot faster, so they went in well after the peas. Of course I did start by sauteing a mirepoix plus some garlic and mushrooms before adding the water and peas.

I think the possibilities are endless. You can make subtle variations to any of these recipes as you figure out what you like and just to change it up.

If you grow tired of rice and quinoa, cook some barley. It's good stuff. I usually use "semi-hulled" barley, also called Blue Streaker Barley. I try not to use pearl barley because it has the bran removed. If I don't use streaker, I just use hulled barely. It takes longer to cook.

You might also explore different kinds of rice. There are so many, and they are all a bit different. Short grain, long grain, basmati, sprouted.... Mmmm. Of course rice also has arsenic, so there's that.

Beans may be good for the heart. I know they are good for the belly!

Rancho Gordo is a wonderful company that specializes in heirloom bean varieties. Whether or not you choose to buy their products (they are available in some good grocery stores as well as from their website) they have a great blog and collection of recipes for beans, grains and salads and the like. Here is their basic info on cooking beans
https://www.ranchogordo.com/blogs/recipes/cooking-basic-beans-in-the-rancho-gordo-manner

I like to substitute beans or lentils for other starchy sides such as potatoes or rice. If cooking dried beans from scratch I like to cook in chicken stock or shellfish bisque. In order not to waste broth I will just cover the beans and top up with water as needed.
If warming up tinned beans I drain them (save bean water for aqua faba) and warm up in a little stock or bisque. I normally have these ingredients in the freezer made from chicken carcasses or shimp shells. Store bought broths save time but are more expensive.

Aqua faba - the liquid from chick peas - is an amazing substance if you are cooking beans. It can be used as you would use egg whites and is an excellent mimic for things like merringue and super useful to make things creamy or fluffy like mousse or hummus. You can make a ton of baked desserts with it if you are interested in trying your hand at that, or you can use it as a replacement for egg whites in fancy cocktails that require a shaken fluffy foam on top.

Also some beans that are more mellow can be a base for non dairy vegetable “cream” soups. I am making a “creamy” soup tonight composed largely of cannelini beans and cauliflower with a half a potato tossed in. I will garnish it with roasted butternut squash, spinach and red onions one night, maybe with baked potato toppings another, and with roasted cherry tomatoes, endive and raddichio (they turn slightly sweet when roasted) another time.