Sunday, 18 April 2010

simply beans

Here's the simplest pot of beans you can make.

Ingredients:
16 oz beans (Rancho Gordo heirloom beans are the best I know of)

Soak the beans in water overnight. Or quick-soak by boiling in water for a minute and letting sit for an hour on the stove.

Cook in enough water to cover + an inch or so for a few hours until tender. Add more water as needed. If you want less water at the end, just let it boil down to the top of the beans but you have to monitor it so the beans don't burn. Smaller beans may only need 1-2 hours, larger beans 2-4. Older beans will take longer.

You can also cook in the pressure cooker. Here you need to add a lot more water. I think it's a 6-1 ratio. See your pressure cooker instruction book. Bean typically need about 10-12 minutes in the pressure cooker after soaking. Again, see your instruction book. They often say to add oil but mine works fine without it.