The joys of cooking with dried beans

VermontCathy

After many years of using canned beans and finding that cooking dried beans was not worth the time and effort, I bought an Instant Pot Max pressure cooker. It has totally changed my usage of dried beans.

Now I can cook garbanzo beans quickly to make homemade hummus, or cook pinto beans quickly to make homemade refried beans.

Dried beans are cheaper than canned, and are easy to store. They keep for a long time.

I plan to grow more shelly beans in my garden this year, and perhaps more dried beans as well. It is great not to be buying all those relatively expensive canned beans!

karenjanicki

Cool tip! Maybe I'll have invest in an instant pot.

Linda Bittle

https://community.thegrownetwork.com/discussion/comment/907959#Comment_907959

I love mine! It's not for everything, but it does excel at some things. I can get a pork roast out of the freezer and have dinner on the table in under an hour.

kbmbillups1

I love my Instant Pot too! I have had 2 for a long time. Then, my husband got me their air fryer last year. Mine came with both the air fryer lid and the regular one so if I really need to I can have all 3 cooking at the same time. I can't say I've ever done it though. I do use 2 often for making soup etc in one and veggies in the other.

I found an Instant Pot at Goodwill a couple months ago for $10.98. It did have a cracked lid and probably would have worked like that but I had saved a lid from my first one from years ago and they were compatible. So, I bought it for my daughter for future use. Plugged it in at the store and it seemed to work so took the chance and brought it home. It works great!

I do make beans in mine if I'm in a hurry. If not I still use my crockpot and let them cook all day. We really like how it makes the house smell! Well - pinto, black, and chilli smell really good. Chickpeas not so much. Those I'd defiantly make in my Instant Pot.

VermontCathy

I don't find chick peas (garbanzo beans) to have much smell at all. They have a wonderful chewy consistency, but their flavor depends on what you cook with them.

Instant Pot devices are also excellent rice cookers. I used to cook rice on the stove top, but while that works, it is very easy to burn the rice if you don't keep a close eye on the moisture level and add water if needed. The Instant Pot will make perfect rice every time.

Tip: make the rice in a small, handleless metal pan that you put inside the Instant Pot. Don't put the rice directly in the Instant Pot cooking pan. Then put exactly the right amount of water in the rice pan (the amount will depend on the type of beans used), and one cup of water in the Instant Pot, outside the small pot holding the rice.

This tricks works perfectly and makes it easier to clean up afterward.

vickeym

My friend has one and loves hers. (I actually gave her the first one she had.) If we get power this summer maybe I will have to get one as well. Have always loved cooking in crockpots (when I had electricity) but you have to plan well ahead for that. The idea of pulling a roast from the freezer and having supper on the table in a hour sounds great.

VermontCathy

@vickeym "If we get power this summer..."

Thanks for the reminder that I am not as rural as I sometimes want to think. :-)

Megan Venturella

I use my Instant Pot for beans and love it just for that! I’d rather soak them the night before, but now I can store more beans and still make hummus or black bean soup without starting it a day in advance.

vickeym

VermontCathy 😁 In Alaska, being "off the grid" is pretty common. We have been at this location since March 2009. The power lines run right down the street past our place we just never hooked to it. Though our little village is considered remote it is not as remote as many others. We had friends that lived "across the river" it was about 15 miles across the river, but it was a 3 hour ride on a 4 wheeler to get there. On a very, very rough trail. Depending on the time of the year you might have to wear full rain gear or you would be soaking wet and covered in mud. Parts of the year you either had to ride a snow machine or walk because it was either too deep in snow or mud. And there are many places including villages that are much more remote even than they were.

Getting power hooked up here is not cheap, especially if there has never been power to the site. In our case the power has to come in about 200 feet and it will run around $2500. That is just inside the edge of our property. We will do the rest ourselves, including renting equipment to dig a ditch to run the line in further, buying the wire, electric panel and breaker box, and so on. That is before power is even hooked up, then you start paying the monthly electric bill.

kbmbillups1

@VermontCathy I guess chickpeas didn't smell as good to me as other beans because at the time I either cooked them in just water or added a bit of salt. I was using the aquafaba as egg replacer so I couldn't add anything to it. I used to have 1 cup baggies of aquafaba packed in the door of my freezer.

Pinto and black beans I add peppers, onion, garlic, salt, and a pinch of baking soda to make them gasless. My entire house smells soooooo good while they're cooking.

marjstratton

I plan on growing some beans for drying this summer. Having a pressure cooker would make it easier to cook dried beans. I used to cook them that way back when I had a pressure cooker.