"Objet petit a" Black Beans

It takes about 4 - 4 1/2 hours to cook, but takes little to no monitoring on your part. Thus, it is easy to cook while you work. But it is also good to make it large quantities when you know you will strapped to desk for a few days trying to meet that paper/chapter deadline. You can use this as the start of a black bean soup, for the base of black bean burritos, on top of black beans and rice, or as the black beans in chili. It is extremely versatile and extremely cheap.

Ingredients: 

2-4 cups of dried black beans (depending on how much you want to make)

3 tablespoons of malt vinegar

1 dried ancho chile

1 dried chipotle chile

1 cinnamon stick

4 cloves of garlic

2 vegetable bullion 

3 tablespoons cumin seed

2 tablespoons chile powder

2 tablespoons paprika

1 tablespoon ground allspice

Directions: 

1) Rinse and sort black beans

2) Quick Soak black beans with malt vinegar

•  Bring beans to a boil in covered pot. Take off heat and let sit for at least an 1 hour.

3) Toast and grind cumin seeds, set aside.

4)  After quick soak, change out water, and add the rest of the ingredients. Bring to a boil and then simmer in a covered pot for about three hours, or until the beans are tender. You will need to check the water level about every hour. Make sure water is about 1-2 inches above the beans at all time.