Cooking Tips for Beans

You need cooking tips...

If your recipe calls for four cups of cooked beans and you have a bag of dry beans on the kitchen counter and don't know what to do.

If your recipe asks you to convert dry bean weight to volume – ½ pound to 1 cup, for example - and you don't know what to do.

If you want tender, flavorful beans for your favorite recipes.

If you want to learn alternative methods for cooking great bean dishes.

Read on!!!

Stovetop Cooking Tips

Cooking Tip #1 - How much do you need?

Beans expand when they cook. Depending on the type of bean, one cup of dry beans (which weighs about ½ pound) will make from 2 ½ to 3 ½ cups of cooked beans.

We generally cook more than we need and freeze any leftovers for a quick lunch of bean salad or a hearty breakfast of Huevos Rancheros.

After you decide how much to cook, spread your beans out on a cookie sheet and pick them over, throwing away any shriveled beans or debris missed in the factory cleaning process. Our local pinto bean processor “triple cleans” its products, but we still go through the beans before cooking.

Wash and drain your beans (additional "clinkers" will float to the surface of the washwater), and you’re ready for soaking and/or cooking.

Cooking Tip #2 - Soaking beans.

This step is not essential if you are prepared to cook your beans for several hours. But soaking shortens the cooking time and saves energy – good for the planet and good for the budget – and we think the beans are more tender.

All dry beans and peas except lentils, split peas and black-eyed peas should be soaked before cooking. Cooking time is reduced, some of the indigestible sugars are leached out and the result is improved flavor, texture, and appearance.

We soak our beans in a large pot, using 6 cups of cold water for each pound (about 2 cups) of dry beans. Cover the pot and let stand at room temperature overnight or for about 6 to 8 hours. In hot weather, soaking beans can begin to ferment (not a good thing) when left at room temperature overnight, so refrigerate the soaking process if it's hot.

If you simply don’t have time for this, add 6 – 8 cups of hot water for each pound of beans, heat to boiling and cook the beans for 2 minutes. Turn off the stove, cover the pot and let the beans stand for one hour. Drain, rinse and you're ready to cook your soaked beans.

Cooking Tip #3 - Cooking presoaked beans.

Put the beans into a large pot. Add 6 cups of fresh water for each pound of soaked beans. You might add some seasonings or some fat to the cooking water or you might cook your beans in broth. Fat, such as a teaspoon of cooking oil, helps prevent foaming while the beans cook.

Don’t add salt or acidic ingredients such as lemon, tomato, or vinegar until beans are almost done (these ingredients slow softening). Bring your beans to a boil, cover with a lid and reduce heat to a simmer. Tilting the lid slightly allows steam to escape and will prevent making a mess on your stovetop.

Simmer the beans until tender, from 1 to 2 hours depending on the variety. The time will vary with the size and type of the beans, your elevation (higher means longer cooking time), and the quality of your water (hard water takes longer).

Cooking Tip #4 - Green beans

Cooking fresh or frozen green beans does not require soaking or precooking. Just steam or saute them with seasonings and serve. At our green bean page we are collecting recipes for this nourishing vegetable.

Alternate Methods of Cooking Beans include:

Slow Cooker: Go to work and return to a house filled with the wonderful fragrance of cooked beans.

Cowboy Beans: For the back country enthusiasts, a Dutch oven and a campfire! Wow!

Pressure Cooker: Even if your daily schedule is crammed, you can leave processed food on the grocery shelves. With pressure cooking, you can enjoy whole foods for healthy eating and a healthy budget.

Solar Oven: Energy-saving cooking at its best! Let the sun do it for you! We often cook our beans this way.

Boston Baked Beans: A beautiful piece of ceramic cookware filled with slow baked beans. A Nor’eastern tradition.

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