A Photo Essay on Soaking Beans

I had to make beans for my favorite 9 year olds' school for Pioneer Days. For 60 kids as a side dish, I thought five pounds seemed about right. Of course, it was about twice as much as I needed but again, I learned a little something.

I thought it would be fun to document the soaking process. I know, fun should include drinks and boarding passes, but I make do using what I have.

So this is five pounds of pintos in plain water:

During the next check in:

And finally, before cooking:

I'm not sure what the point of this is except that I'd read that most of the absorption of water happens in the first two hours. This may be but as you can see, the last hour was almost equal to the first two. I feel comfortable saying 3-4 hours for beans that have been harvested within two years is a good guideline.

What difference does it make soaking or just cooking? Well, I really think the texture of soaked beans is superior and there are fewer surprises. You probably won't have to add much, if any, water while cooking and you have a better idea of your yield. If I hadn't soaked, I'd still just go ahead and cook them without a soak.

More on Grinding Masa

this video will be about as interesting as watching mud dry for most of you, but it demonstrates the Indian machine called Ultra Pride and how it grinds nixtamalized corn into masa. It’s not perfect but it’s a good compromise if you’re a little (ok, a lot) obsessive.

Perfect Pintos

Here's another reader recipe. Canice Flanagan is going to need to start her own blog pretty soon. Followed by a cookbook deal, television show, guest judge stint on Iron Chef, etc. In the meantime, I'm more than happy to share her kitchen discoveries.

Perfect Pintos

1# pinto beans, cooked in the Rancho Gordo manner – 1 cup pot liquor reserved.

2 T corn oil
1 medium white onion, finely chopped
1 bunch green onions, thinly sliced
3 Roma tomatoes, chopped
2 jalapeños, minced
2 cloves garlic, minced
¾ cup ale
1 T hot sauce
2/3 cup cilantro leaves, chopped

Cook beans as directed.  Reserve 1 cup pot liquor, and set aside both beans and pot liquor.

Heat oil in a large sauté pan over medium flame.  Add white onions, and cook 1 minute, stirring.  Add in green onions and cook 1 minute more.  Stir in Roma tomatoes.  Add cooked beans, jalapeños, garlic, ale, and hot sauce.  Increase heat and bring to a boil.  Reduce to a very low flame and simmer 20 minutes.  Add reserved pot liquor, as necessary, to keep beans moist.  Stir in chopped cilantro and simmer five minutes more.

Serve hot, as a side to barbecue, or fold into burritos or tacos.  Enjoy.

TRUE CONFESSIONS! Or Anything I’ve Learned of Any Value Comes From the Garden

Unfortunately I came to gardening and growing late in life. I grew up a pretty typical child of the 1960s in California. The good parts were my parents' love of Modern Jazz and the West Coast Sound. My memories of suburban life were of Dad diving for abalone and coming home to a big backyard barbecue. He'd grill the abalone along with thick, juicy steaks, which were served with a Caesar salad and ice cold gin martinis (in those days there was no other kind.) I remember all of our ashtrays were really spent abalone shells and I can still see the small little piles of ash that would form from the holes along the edge of the shell.

The bad part of this upbringing was a complete void as far as nature was concerned, beyond the abalone shells. Wine tasting was the Great Outdoors. Our house had grass that needed watering and mowing and that's about it, except for a brief but manic house plant phase my mother went through in the 1970s.

This might sound like a little too much confession
for you but the fact is that I grew up being one of those people who
craved success but didn't do a whole lot to achieve it. I just wanted
it and it didn't seem fair that others were enjoying it when I had so
much to offer and no one knew it. In fact, I don't think I had much to
offer except a lack of humility and little understanding of How Life
Works.

In my 30s, I experienced some humiliating financial situations and I
had many unfortunate jobs. I think in some way I knew I had to start
over and reinvent myself, even if the decision wasn't conscious.

I won't go into all the details (you'll need to buy me a drink for
that!) but slowly things started to fall into place. I also started
gardening at the same time. Plants and shrubs to start but it was when
I started growing food that I started growing up. And here are just a
few of the things I learned, and continue to learn:

• No matter how much I wished for it to go faster, nature had its own plan.
• There's something very satisfying in laying out your garden,
  weeding, planting seeds and then watering. But the next week is filled
  with anxiety as you wait. And you wait. And you doubt yourself.
• When the first seedlings pop up, you are relieved but your work isn't over, no matter how busy you are.
• You have to be on your game for the entire growing season, yet you can relax and you can't rush things.
• You can do everything right and a force of nature can bring you down.
• If you've laid a strong foundation, you can slack every now and
  then, but not for long and not always when you want it (or need it).
• The rewards when you eat your first tomato are beyond measure and make the whole thing worth the bother.
• I don't need to buy a lot of crap to be happy. My happiness now
  comes from seed and ends up on the dining room table. The complete
  circle is what really makes me happy.
• If you fail, there's always next year.

I hope I don't sound like a greeting card. I've found all these things to be true. It's funny that when I stopped being ambitious and just started doing what I loved, I achieved my first real dose of success.

TRUE CONFESSIONS! Or Anything I’ve Learned of Any Value Comes From the Garden

Unfortunately I came to gardening and growing late in life. I grew up a pretty typical child of the 1960s in California. The good parts were my parents' love of Modern Jazz and the West Coast Sound. My memories of suburban life were of Dad diving for abalone and coming home to a big backyard barbecue. He'd grill the abalone along with thick, juicy steaks, which were served with a Caesar salad and ice cold gin martinis (in those days there was no other kind.) I remember all of our ashtrays were really spent abalone shells and I can still see the small little piles of ash that would form from the holes along the edge of the shell.

The bad part of this upbringing was a complete void as far as nature was concerned, beyond the abalone shells. Wine tasting was the Great Outdoors. Our house had grass that needed watering and mowing and that's about it, except for a brief but manic house plant phase my mother went through in the 1970s.

This might sound like a little too much confession
for you but the fact is that I grew up being one of those people who
craved success but didn't do a whole lot to achieve it. I just wanted
it and it didn't seem fair that others were enjoying it when I had so
much to offer and no one knew it. In fact, I don't think I had much to
offer except a lack of humility and little understanding of How Life
Works.

In my 30s, I experienced some humiliating financial situations and I
had many unfortunate jobs. I think in some way I knew I had to start
over and reinvent myself, even if the decision wasn't conscious.

I won't go into all the details (you'll need to buy me a drink for
that!) but slowly things started to fall into place. I also started
gardening at the same time. Plants and shrubs to start but it was when
I started growing food that I started growing up. And here are just a
few of the things I learned, and continue to learn:

• No matter how much I wished for it to go faster, nature had its own plan.
• There's something very satisfying in laying out your garden,
  weeding, planting seeds and then watering. But the next week is filled
  with anxiety as you wait. And you wait. And you doubt yourself.
• When the first seedlings pop up, you are relieved but your work isn't over, no matter how busy you are.
• You have to be on your game for the entire growing season, yet you can relax and you can't rush things.
• You can do everything right and a force of nature can bring you down.
• If you've laid a strong foundation, you can slack every now and
  then, but not for long and not always when you want it (or need it).
• The rewards when you eat your first tomato are beyond measure and make the whole thing worth the bother.
• I don't need to buy a lot of crap to be happy. My happiness now
  comes from seed and ends up on the dining room table. The complete
  circle is what really makes me happy.
• If you fail, there's always next year.

I hope I don't sound like a greeting card. I've found all these things to be true. It's funny that when I stopped being ambitious and just started doing what I loved, I achieved my first real dose of success.

Here They Come!

We went from late frosts to heatwaves here in Napa so there wasn’t a lot of time to do things right. I didn’t prepare the beds well, I completely blew it with the irrigation system and ended up having to hand water everything and it seems late.

And then I woke up to this and I know it’s going to be a good season.

Google Mapping Your Garden

You may think I’m nuts but this seemed incredibly fun and possibly helpful. I took a screenshot of my place using Google Maps and then drew a diagram to show where things were being grown.

My place is kind of rural so the detail isn’t great but I still think this may be handy.

Growing Beans in a Pot

We’re finally coming to an end of the planting here in Napa. I have almost 2 acres chock-a-block full of beans that I found in Mexico, ordered from the Internet or were sent from you. This year, with some of the extras, I put them in a regular pot filled with potting soil.

You can use any bean but the runner beans (like Scarlet Runner or Cellini) can cascade down the sides of the pot, looking dramatic and yet yielding a tasty treat!

Don’t presoak the beans. Just direct seed them and keep the pot moist until the first signs of life appear, then water as you would any plant after that.