Rustic Black Bean and Sweet Potato Soup + How to Cook Beans

Who needs a solid warm-up? Yup, right here. It’s still winter.
To combat the never-ending chilly-ness, I have been living on soups. Easy-to-make, filling, nourishing, warming, and inexpensive - a big pot of hot lovin’ is the ideal way to make it through these last winter days.

This black bean soup is a favorite recipe of mine. I made it up on day at work, last winter I believe, and it was a real winner with the customers and the staff. The beans make it hearty and incredibly satisfying, and the vegetable ingredients are flexible – really just use what you have on hand.

The secret to this soup however, is cooking the beans from scratch. Yup, I said it. It’s time people.
Cooking beans from dried is a lot easier than you think. For some reason, everyone seems to be thrown off by the whole ‘soaking’ thing, and the idea that they may have to think about cooking something in the near future as opposed to whipping up a dish spontaneously. I get that. But the all-of-15-seconds it takes to put dried beans in a bowl and cover with water is about as difficult as velcroing your shoes. Ugh! Followed closely by the agonizing task of filling a pot with water and turning the heat on. I know, it’s a lot.
Can we get over this silliness? Thanks.

I’ve come up with a list that should further help to inform (convince) you that dried beans are your friends, because I really feel strongly about these little guys.

1. Cost – has anyone noticed how expensive canned beans are?! I mean, it’s kinda crazy. I think the number one reason to use dried beans in place of canned ones is the amount of money you’ll save. It’s like a bean sale everyday of the year – five for the price of one.
2. Health – dried beans are healthier because you cook them yourself and control exactly what goes in them. They are not sitting in can-captivity with ridiculously high levels of sodium, additives like calcium chloride, and the potential of being exposed to bisphenol A (BPA) through the can lining. Ever read the ingredients on a bag of dried beans? Beans.
3. Taste – honestly, once you cook your own beans, you’ll never go back to canned ones – you’ve been warned. The flavour and texture of home-cooked beans is light years beyond anything that has been sitting in a tin for months (or years). And instead of the completely mushy consistency that we often associate with beans (no wonder kids hate them!), dried beans cook up to a wide range of textures from al dente (for salads) to well-done (for soups and dips), depending on what you’re going to use them for.
4. Less waste – for the amount of food you get from a can of beans, the waste is huge. By purchasing dried beans you are doing a great service to the environment, as there is no mining for metal involved, no tree cutting or paper milling, no toxic inks, and no energy for recycling.
5. Variety – it is pretty difficult to find a can of Christmas Lima beans at the grocery store, isn’t it? How about Flageolets? Anasazi? Lupini? The beauty of buying dried beans is the enormous selection you’ll find! A whole world of legumes will be open to you and your lucky palette. Chickpeas, I still love you, but Jackson Wonders and Steuben Yellows got ya’ beat.



Cooking black beans from dried
Ingredients:
2 cups dried black beans
6 cups water
2 Tbsp. sea salt (optional)

Directions:
1. Place black beans and plenty of clean water in a large bowl and let soak overnight, or for at least 8 hours (Sarah B. tip: if it’s a workday, soak in the morning before going to work; if it’s the weekend, soak them before going to bed at night).
2. After soaking, drain and rinse the beans very well, making sure to remove any stones or debris that may have slipped into the batch.
3. Place beans and 6 cups clean water into a large pot, add salt. With the heat on high, bring beans to a boil, then reduce to simmer. At this point, there may be some foam that sits on top of the water– remove it with a slotted spoon.
4. Cook beans until tender (this will vary greatly on your own beans, but for black beans you’re looking at approximately 45 minutes. The good news is, for this soup it doesn’t really matter how long you cook them for, as you will be pureeing a portion of them anyway.)
5. Remove beans from stove and drain with a bowl underneath the sieve to catch the cooking liquid (this is an important step for the soup).

Yay. You just cooked beans.

Note: this is the method for most bean cooking, with slight variations in cooking time depending on the bean variety. You can add salt if you like, but it’s not totally necessary. I find that if I am cooking beans for a salad for instance, it’s a very important step, as the beans won’t taste of much individually if they are not salted prior to cooking. In a soup or dip, you can season to taste at the end.



Black Bean and Sweet Potato Soup
4 cups cooked black beans (from 2 cups dried) + 4 cups cooking liquid
1 large red onion
3 leeks
8 cloves garlic
1 large sweet potato
4 carrots
½ head of celeriac (celery root)
2 Tbsp. ghee/oil of your choice
1 Tbsp. ground cumin
2 tsp. ground corriander
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
¼ tsp. crushed chilies
3 large tomatoes, diced or 1 small can tomatoes (14.5 oz / 400 gr.)
juice of 1 lemon
1 Tbsp. maple syrup
2 Tbsp. olive oil
sea salt
cilantro

1. Heat ghee/oil in a large pot over medium heat, then add spices. Stir until fragrant.
2. Add chopped onion, leek, and salt. Cook for a few minutes until vegetables begin to wilt a bit. Add garlic, the rest of the chopped vegetables and tomatoes. Stir occasionally.
5. Using a blender, immersion blender, or food processor, puree 2 cups of the cooked beans (approx. half the total amount) with 4 cups of the reserved cooking liquid. Add to the pot with the remaining whole, cooked beans.
6. Simmer on medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are tender, about 15 minutes.
7. Season to taste. Add the juice of 1 lemon, olive oil, maple syrup, and cilantro.
8. Serve immediately with a drizzle of cold-pressed olive oil, cilantro, and a chunk of cornbread (working the kinks out of that recipe!) Store leftovers in the fridge; freezes well.
(p.s. this is even better the next day.)

I hope that this soup gives you a very good excuse to try cooking beans from dried sometime in the near future. It really is incredibly simple, and I feel one of those satisfying culinary activities that perhaps takes you one step out of your comfort zone, but certainly one step closer to your food.

Dining in the Dark

Hello to All!
Well, I am back on Danish soil – very cold and wet soil, as it turns out. I miss Los Angeles just a tad already, but I suppose it’s only the sunshine that really stole my heart, the rest of that fast-paced, always-in-a-car lifestyle I could leave behind for a while. One thing that I truly marveled at in L.A. was the total lack of home cooking and the incredible frequency of restaurant dining and take-out. It was like no one knew how to make food for themselves; all fridges jammed with convenience meals or Styrofoam containers of lowly leftovers. It could have just been the crowd I was rolling with, but it just seemed like the norm to eat out several times a week, if not more than once during a single day! Craziness.

So it perfect timing when one of my old students emailed me asking if she could write an article for My New Roots to complete a project for her university class on Social Context. Her assignment focused on ways to make a difference in her community, and she chose to write about decreasing the waste consumption in restaurants by informing consumers about the waste of the restaurant industry and creating a demand for greener restaurants, while also providing restaurants with ways to become more environmentally friendly. Awesome! This could not have come at a better time.

Without further ado, I present Dining in the Dark – a project to help us all be a little more conscious when eating out.

***
As much as I wish that I could be as creative and talented as Sarah is in the kitchen, I frankly am not. And if you are like me, you find yourself eating out more than twice a week. However, have you ever really stopped and thought about the ramifications of requesting that meal, getting that takeout, or ordering that delivery? Many of us do not think about the environmental consequences that are connected every time we choose to eat out, mainly because we have been left to dine in the dark.

So, what kind of repercussions am I talking about?

Well, simply put, the restaurant industry is one of the most waste producing and energy consuming hospitality industries out there. An average of 50,000 – 100,000 pounds of trash are produced by a single restaurant every year; that’s more than 50 times the amount that the average person throws away a year! On top of that, a restaurant uses up to 29 gallons of water per meal, equaling an average of 5,800 gallons of water in one day!
Ever wonder how the food on your plate got there? Well, the average fresh food item travels 1,500 miles before reaching your plates. That is equal to 14 tons of carbon emissions or 71 trees!!

What can even be done?
You’re probably now thinking to yourself, “Oh that’s great, but what am I supposed to do about that?” Do not fret because there are many easy ways that you, as consumers, can make a positive change in the very unsustainable restaurant industry. For example:
1. When getting take out, ask the restaurants to exclude plastic utensils and paper napkins in favour of using your own metal utensils at home.

2. Always try to recycle when possible. If the restaurant does not have a recycling bin, suggest to management to provide one! Through recycling, restaurants can cut back on their waste by 95%!

3. Buy and ask for locally grown food! Through cutting back on transportation and production costs of mass produced crops, you are really helping to decrease carbon emissions. Plus locally grown food just tastes better!

4. Take initiative and make a change both at home and at restaurants! Opt for beeswax candles or LED candles over regular paraffin candles. Or even start using non-toxic cleaning chemicals at home by making your own cleaning products. If you want to know about the benefits of choosing these healthier options, just read one of Sarah’s previous posts, such as “The Burning Question” and “DIY Birkenstock-free Cleaning Products”. When you start seeing the difference that it makes at home, start suggesting it to your neighbourhood restaurants!

5. Tell restaurants about our initiative!!! Any restaurant can contact us at dininginthedark.org@gmail.com and we can help them get on their way to a greener future!

Now that you know about truth of dining out, maybe you’ll think differently when you go out to eat instead of dining in.
For more information, follow our facebook page or visit our blog.

Thanks for listening and stay bright!

-Dining in the Dark

Sources: Green your Dining Out and the Green Restaurant Association

Eating Compassionately

I had a rather upsetting experience a couple weeks ago.

I was driving down the highway somewhere outside of Toronto, overtaking a large freight truck, which from behind looked rather unremarkable. However, as I passed the cargo-loaded back end, I realized that the truck was filled with baby pigs. I could clearly see their little faces through the air holes in the metal wall, and there were even ears and snouts poking out, desperately sniffing the fresh air. I was so furious and upset, witnessing how cruelly restricted they were, and undoubtedly heading towards a slaughterhouse – if they would make it there alive.

Fortunately, three prominent Canadian animal welfare groups, Animal Alliance of Canada, the Canadian Coalition for Farm Animals (CCFA) and the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) are working to protect farm animals during transport, and they are championing MP Alexandra Mendès’ Private Members’ Bill seeking to improve farm animal transport regulations.
The existing transport regulations, part of the Health of Animals Act, state no limits on how long entire journeys must be, which means that animals are traveling by land, sea and air for days and even weeks. The intervals at which animals being transported must receive food, water and rest are far too long – with devastating consequences for the animals.

“People should be aware of what animals go through from farm to slaughter. It is inhumane to deprive an animal of food, water or rest for 81 hours and to subject them to such unhealthy and stressful conditions. Animals experience terror, pain and suffering. If the Minister of Agriculture can alleviate some of this suffering and make our food safer by reducing farm animal transport times, then this is something he should do. We are grateful to Mrs. Mendes for putting forward a bill that will protect both animals and Canadians.” Karen Levenson, Animal Alliance of Canada

My reasons for being a vegetarian have fluctuated over the past decade or so. I believe I took on the life choice for environmental reasons, then for my health, and I have recently discovered the joys of supporting the welfare of animals through my vegetarian diet, knowing that my choice will help spare the suffering of many lives. But this is not an article about vegetarianism.

My goal for this article was simply to plant a seed of awareness so that you can take action in your own way. I am not asking for you to make a major life change, as becoming a vegetarian is as such. But I am encouraging you to consider where your meat comes from, what it was fed, how it was raised, and brought to you. I realize that there is a great disconnect between the animal itself and the food on your plate, but bear in mind that every time you eat meat you are voting for, and supporting the kinds of conditions that that animal lived, good or bad. Choosing free-range meat that is raised organically is a good start towards standing up for animal rights, but choosing to cutback, or cut out meat consumption is of course, the strongest statement you can make.

After the pig truck experience, I went online to see how I could get involved. I was shocked to discover how many resources, support groups and advocates for animal rights specific to factory farming exist. After hours of research, I have narrowed the field down to what I believe are the most informative and useful links for you to visit!

- Website of The Animal Freedom Foundation: a portal for presenting articles and books about (the basics of) animal rights, healthy food in general and ways to end factory farming in particular.
http://www.animalfreedom.org/english/index.htm

- World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA): to build a global animal welfare movement.
http://www.wspa.ca/default.aspx

- Here is a link to the compassionate shopping guide – it’s free! : http://www.ciwf.org.uk/resources/shopping_guide/download.aspx

- World Animal Net: The world's largest database of animal protection societies, with over 16,000 listings and more than 10,000 links to Web Sites
http://worldanimalnet.org/new.asp

Please have a look, sign a petition or two, or better yet, get involved! The last link is the best way to find animal welfare groups in your very own city. Thanks.

sources: Quebec MP's bill to ease suffering on Canada's highways (2009) viewed Nov. 1 2009 http://www.wspa.ca/latestnews/2009/quebec_mps_bill_to_ease_suffering_on_canadas_highways.aspx
image source:uppompeii1.uppompeii.com