18 Delicious Recipes with Dried Beans (2024)

FAQs

What do you do with dried beans? ›

Add a pinch of salt. If you have any aromatics lying around — things you'd use to make stock like onions, carrots, celery, bay leaves or woody herbs such as rosemary and thyme — add them to cooking liquid. You don't have to add aromatics, but they'll make your beans so much more flavorful.

You can expect 1 cup of dried beans to yield about 3 cups cooked beans. One pound of dried beans (which is about 2 cups) will yield about 6 cups cooked beans. If a recipe calls for canned beans: 1 15-oz can of beans equals about 2 cups cooked beans.

Bottom Line. If beans make you uncomfortably gassy, sprinkle a little baking soda into their soaking water. It will reduce the volume of gas produced by the legumes, plus, they will cook quicker. If you're even shorter on time, you may want to try some of our favorite recipes to make with a can of black beans.

Modern cooking websites often say it doesn't matter. In a way, they're both right. Soaking beans can help improve the texture of the final product once the beans are cooked and reduce the gas produced when the food is being digested. But it isn't necessary to soak them.

Those aromatics in the pot will revolutionize the beans' final flavor. The aromatics I tend to use are onions, carrots, garlic, and celery, and then heartier, woodsy herbs, like rosemary, sage, and thyme, which marry beautifully with the earthy-sweet flavor of beans.

The addition of baking soda to the cooking water does two things: It adds sodium ions that weaken the pectin as explained above, and more importantly, an alkaline environment causes the pectin molecules to break down into smaller molecules that greatly weakens the pectin causing the beans to soften much more rapidly.

While lard has been replaced with vegetable oil or shortening in many households, the distinct richness and velvety texture it imparts to a skillet of refried beans is hard to beat. The closest substitute for lard is bacon grease, which is another form of rendered pork fat that's arguably even more flavorful.

While most packages of dried beans do not come with an expiration date, they will not last forever. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's FoodKeeper app says, “For freshness and quality, dried beans should be consumed within 1 to 2 years if in the pantry from the date of purchase; 1 year if pantry stored after opening.”

Do you cook beans covered or uncovered? ›

If you simmer beans in an uncovered pot, they will end up firmer and more intact. This perfect for dishes where you really want the beans to keep their shape without smooshing, like salads and pasta dishes.

Add ajwain or epazote – both of these spices will decrease gas production – I swear by the epazote! Just add about a tablespoon to a large pot of beans during the cooking process. You can also add ginger or cumin as these spices help with digestion.

A couple of commonly used over-the-counter enzymes have long been known to work. These include Lactaid and Beano, used by people who are lactose intolerant or who have gas or bloating after eating legumes, respectively.

To cut down on the gassy properties, you can add a little baking soda to your recipe. The baking soda helps break down some of the beans' natural gas-making sugars. I tested this while fixing one of my favorite slow cooker recipes: red beans and sausage.

Beans are rich in a number of important micronutrients, including potassium, magnesium, folate, iron, and zinc, and are important sources of protein in vegetarian diets. In particular, they are among the only plant foods that provide significant amounts of the indispensable amino acid lysine.

Takeaway: You don't have to soak your beans; but if you do, cook the beans in their soaking liquid. Myth 3: If you don't soak overnight, you should at least quick-soak.

Ingredients like onions, garlic, herbs, and chiles infuse the dried beans with tons of flavor as they slowly cook and soak up all that aromatic liquid. It's just not the same if you add identical ingredients to a pot of already-cooked canned beans.

Supermarkets sell bagged dry beans and canned products such as refried beans, soups, chili and baked beans. Restaurants use dry edible beans in foods such as tacos, burritos and chili.