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Bean by Bean – A Cookbook

By Ann Hattes
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In addition to tips on cooking once for several meals, there is a helpful overview of bean soaking and cooking methods with pros and cons, and quick-cooking charts for dried beans and lentils.

Once thought of as peasant food, beans are now haute cuisine at many of the world’s finest restaurants. With the abundance of fresh beans for sale at local farmers markets, about 20 varieties of dried beans and 15 kinds of canned beans stocked at most supermarkets, and countless more heirloom varieties available online, there couldn’t be a better time to experiment with this delectable, healthful, endlessly versatile ingredient.

Bean by Bean: A Cookbook (Workman Publishing) by Crescent Dragonwagon offers more than 175 recipes – from curry, chili, stew, soup or salad to bread, tender crepes, dessert cake, even ice cream and candy. For many years Dragonwagon ladled up beans and sliced cornbread at Dairy Hollow House in Arkansas, serving among her hungry diners, President Bill Clinton, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, feminist Betty Friedan and crooner Andy Williams.

Beans are a nutritional cornucopia of protein, fiber, vitamins, healthful omega-3 fats, calcium, potassium, zinc, and many other essential nutrients. The recipes are coded as meatist, gluten-free, vegetarian, and/or vegan (meat optional). In addition to tips on cooking once for several meals, there is a helpful overview of bean soaking and cooking methods with pros and cons, and quick-cooking charts for dried beans and lentils.

Dragonwagon’s Bean by Bean: A Cookbook also gives many fascinating facts about beans. Cooked beans can be frozen for up to six months. Thaw overnight in the fridge before reheating. It’s possible to mitigate the gas-making effects of beans through controlling factors such as cooking method and duration, complementary ingredients and the variety of bean used. The least “flatulating” legumes are said to be lentils, split peas, adzuki beans, mung beans, and black-eyed peas. Beans, their kin, and the products made from them, such as tofu and tempeh, are the single most concentrated source of plant-based protein in the world. Between 6 and 11 percent of a cooked bean’s weight is protein.

In ancient Rome, so esteemed were legumes that the four leading families took their names from them: Lentullus (lentil), Piso (pea), Cicero (chickpea), and Fabius (fava). Some ancient cults who believed in reincarnation, most notably the monastic followers of Pythagoras, thought human souls traveled through the stems of bean plants to Hades, where they were then transmogrified for their next lives; it was therefore a sin to eat beans or even walk among bean plants.

In terms of sheer numbers and staggering diversity, no part of the world comes close to matching the abundance and variety of beans available in America: kidney and black beans, navy and cranberry, lima, white runner, scarlet runner, brown tepary and white tepary, calico, eye-of-the-goat, nightfall, fresh green beans and more!

 


Here are a couple of Dragonwagon’s recipes to try:

Baked Limas with Rosy Sour Cream

Green Bean & Vegetable Fritters

 

Ann Hattes has over 25 years experience writing about both travel and food for publications both in the US and internationally. A senior living in Wisconsin, she’s a member of the International Food, Wine and Travel Writers Association and the Midwest Travel Writers Association.


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