touche beans, touche

ever heard the expression "not worth beans?" as in, not worth much? well. i have, so there. to bean de-valuers and naysayers i say: bah. beans are super good for you, and also very tasty, and also CHEAP which, right now, means a LOT to me. i've even been making them in my dutch oven on my wood stove, a double whammy for my husband because he doesn't have to pay for any extra energy for the cooking of them. actually, i've been cooking quite a bit on the ol' wood stove, but that's another blog. the basic recipe that i've been working with is two cups beans, one heaping teaspoon each sugar and salt, one dried ancho chili, torn up, two slices of bacon and half an onion, diced. top it off with about 6 cups of water and plunk it on the wood stove once the morning fire stops roaring and leave it there all day, stirring occasionally. i'm betting this would work in a low crock pot too, but i've not done it that way. you could leave out the bacon, if you wanted to go meatless, but in that case i'd add some olive oil. maybe even as much as 1/4 cup. on the bacon front another cool idea is to cut an inch or so from the fattiest ends of your bacon and toss those in. then the bacon you fry up for breakfast will be that much leaner (less messy) and your beans will be that much tastier! a couple of months ago i made a pot that i added maple syrup to, and that was also very tasty. the point, as usual, is this: try it. it's cheap, healthy, and tasty, so that's all my bases covered, with the added bonus once again of you knowing exactly what you're eating.