Best Pot O' Beans

I have a confession... I have slacked on my blogging for over a month. But... I'm back! And the good news is I have some great new recipes for you to try that are easy to make and store well in the fridge or freezer. I love having a spare dish or two in the freezer that allows me to whip up a meal when I am short on time.

I grew up in a house where homemade pinto beans were sure to show up as a side dish in at least one meal per week. Why so popular? Plenty of protein, easy to prep, and kids love 'em. Now that I have to feed big hungry bear every night, I picked up my mom's tradition, and I make a pot almost every week. The best part is, beans refrigerate for up to two weeks and they freeze well too. I've got my recipe figured out just the way I like it, but you can add or subtract ingredients to your taste!

Ingredients:
- 1 pound bag of pinto beans (or any other kind of bean -- white, red, or northern)
- 1 yellow onion chopped (special tip to follow on how to prep in advance!)
- 1-2 cloves of garlic, depending on how much you love garlic
- 2 teaspoons of salt
- 1 teaspoon of pepper
- 1 can Hunts tomato sauce (second best option is 1 can of Rotel)
- 1 teaspoon of oregano (optional)
- 1 slice of bacon or cut up sausage dog (optional)
- 6 cups of water

First and foremost, if you don't already have one, you need a Crock Pot. How are you supposed to go to work all day then spend 4 hours making a pot of beans? Forget about it. The Crock Pot is these best way to simmer a dish for hours while you have your mind on other things. Here is the one I use -- Rival 6.5 quart slow cooker...

Step 1 - Wash and soak the beans. While soaking the beans is not a requirement, it makes them nice and plump. Your beans will turn out fine without soaking, but they will not enlarge and the bean itself will not be as soft when consumed. This happens because the beans are dried before packaging and they only soften with the re-absorption of water. Washing the beans IS mandatory because the package of beans almost always has tiny morsels of hard black dirt either on the beans or mixed throughout. It's a fact of life. I wash and soak simultaneously. Three options here:

A. Best Option: Soak beans for three hours (or overnight is great too!) in room temperature water. The best way for beans to reabsorb water is to give them plenty o'time to do their thing.
B. Second Best Option (my usual method): Boil a kettle of water. Pour over beans already in crock pot, and place lid on top to keep steam in. Soak beans for about an hour.
C. Last Resort but still works: Parboil the beans. Boil water in a pot and flash boil the beans for about 15 minutes. The beans will soften but won't be super plump.

Whatever you do, after soaking the beans, you must drain or strain the water out (dirt WILL rise out) and start over with fresh water.

Step 2: After rinsing, put the beans back in the crock pot. Combine all other ingredients. Did I not say this was so easy?

Here's a little trick... Almost every ingredient on this list, including the beans, can keep in the pantry for a long, long time... Except the onion. I learned a little trick from my mother-in-law on how to preserve onions. I buy them, peel and chop them immediately, then store them all cut up in a ziplock baggie in the freezer. Just take the bag out of the freezer, bang it on the counter a few times to break up the pieces and start cooking with frozen onion. This trick works EVERY TIME with EVERY MEAL that calls for cooked onion. You can saute it, and it works just like regular onion. You can throw it right in the crock pot. So that's my shout to my family in East Texas; thankful for you teaching me tricks like these!

Step 3: Cover crock pot with lid and set timer for 8 hours on low heat or 4 hours on high heat. I prefer 8 hours because the flavors have more time to meld and soak into the beans.

Step 4: Serve with rice or almost any meal you can think of!

Enjoy!