a bean salad chart for you, with love
plus a list of of ideas for what to do with...nuts!
Hi everyone,
Thanks so much for your enthusiasm on Tuesday!! I’m so glad to be giving this newsletter more energy and start making Tuesdays all about LUNCH and offer you more recipes. …if you have no idea what I’m talking about, see here.
Join me this coming Sunday, October 6th, for My GO-TO TO-GO LUNCHES! Is this the best class title I’ve come up with? Perhaps! See below for more info!
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Okay, onto today’s helpful stuff. I’ve got a chart of beans salads and a list of ideas for what to do with nuts for you. These might seem like a funny combo, but they come by special request from my pal Marge who is an amazing volunteer/board member at the food pantry in our town. She was doing inventory in the pantry recently and let me know that there were a TON of beans (both dried and canned) and nuts that don’t seem to get a lot of traction with our clients. “Can you come up with some recipes...or better still one of your charts that puts together the things we have for folks to try?” Marge asked. How could I not say yes to that!
So up first, a chart of bean salad ideas. As you’ll see, I think the winning formula for a great bean salad is cooked beans + something crunchy to balance beans’ creaminess + an allium (something in the onion family) for a little edge + a great dressing to just make it all taste amazing. Bean salads are wonderful because:
they’re affordable, filling + infinitely adaptable
you can make a lot at once, especially because bean salads can happily sit in your fridge for a few days
they can be a side dish, a topping for another salad, or something like a salsa that you can spoon on top of things like roast chicken or baked fish
they’re very portable! take some in a container with you to work or school for lunch, perhaps with a piece of fruit and a muffin or something…you know what you like!
You can make bean salads with canned beans that you've rinsed and drained, or with beans you've cooked from dry. To cook beans from dry, use a pressure cooker (like an Instant Pot) to make the process extra fast, or just simmer in plenty of water until soft (it can take a while, but it's mostly unattended time; you can also soak the beans ahead to speed up the cooking). If you’re cooking beans from dry, you can do simply water, or add flavor to the water with things like crushed garlic, roughly chopped onion, rosemary, dried oregano, etc.
Feel free to swap out ingredients and use whatever you've got on hand. The chart is a suggestion and a formula, not a prescription.
Hey did you like this chart? If so, you’ll lovvvvveeee my new cooking WHAT GOES WITH WHAT which has TWENTY CHARTS (!!!) and full recipes for every single example. It will be out in less than two weeks and you can pre-order it here!
And now for my list of ideas for nuts….what can’t they do?!!
IN GENERAL: Roast for extra flavor / roast with some oil and spices for even more flavor….either way, just put them in an even layer on a sheet pan in a 375ºF oven and roast until lightly browned and they smell…nutty! Anywhere from 10 to 20 minutes depending on the type of nut and your oven.
BREAKFAST! Use nuts to top oatmeal, yogurt or cottage cheese (plus whatever else you’d like, such as berries or canned peaches). Roughly chop nuts and stir into pancake or muffin batters, or add to smoothies for extra protein and richness.
LUNCH + DINNER! Use to top salads, soups, grain bowls, pastas, roasted vegetables or any stir-fry. Finely chop and use as a crust on baked fish or chicken. Or finely chop and combine with crumbled, sautéd tofu and use to make vegetarian tacos.
DRESSINGS + SAUCES: Blend into salad dressings and pestos! Cashews are especially great for making things creamy. Toasted nuts of all kinds are great blended with herbs for pestos (see here for a chart!).
SNACKS! Make your own trail mix with nuts (raw or roasted), dried fruit, chocolate chips...whatever you want! Fill celery with cream cheese and top with roasted nuts. Add to a cheese board. Just enjoy nuts on their own for a snack.
BAKING! Pecan pie or bars, banana nut loaf, chocolate chip + walnut cookies, etc. Use nuts wherever you want more flavor and crunch in a baked good.
FLOUR! Place any type of nut into a blender or food processor and grind to a fine powder and you’ve got your own nut flour! Use in any recipe that calls for nut flour (or substitute for up to half of the regular flour in just about any baking recipe). Or try making
's almond flour pancakes!
Okay, this was a fun one! Take good care everyone and talk to you really soon. xooxoxoxo Julia
Yum! I cooked a lb of black beans in my instant pot and they're languishing in my fridge, perfect timing. I also made your southwest dressing for a salad yesterday; I guess this week is "Eating with Julia"!