How Cooked Is Too Cooked? (link to article)To Pat

[Guest guest]

Thanks Pat, I appreciate your advise and your spirit as well.

 

Brett Sanders,

 

veggiehound <veggiehound wrote:

 

 

> I was chatting with a friend last night and he told me that I was cooking my

black beans too long and that I need to only cook them for 2 hours or so.

 

Aren't friends wonderful? You develop a wonderful recipe that's good enough

that you drool at breakfast time just anticipating it every day for lunch, and

they tell you you're making it all wrong! I cook my beans until they're just

done,

not mushy, but that's my preference. The exception is in some soups -

because sometimes, regardless of what others think, we just like a nice

mushy bean or lentil or whatever in the soup.

 

I'd say cook them until they are how you like them. I know this query is riding

on the back of that article about cooking foods too much, but I think most of us

here are very conscious of our food and eat lots of things fresh and raw in

salads and sandwiches as well as some very lightly steamed or stirfried. (The

last I have been known to refer to as a way of eating salad hot, since I leave

stir-'fried' vegetables very crisp.)

 

But since you ask about cooking time for black beans, this is what I have

learned: Soak the beans overnight, drain, and place in a saucepan with three

cups of water for every cup of the dried beans. Cook about 1-1/2 to 1-3/4

hours or until tender, adding salt and seasoning ten minutes before the end.

Works for me.

 

Now go and do it your way!