Skip to main content

Cowboy Beans

I don't know about you but, growing up, beans were a weekly occurrence around our house (I wasn't a fan), and if you asked my husband he might exaggerate and say that they had to eat them every day! (though I'd guess he's not exaggerating much) As a child, there's nothing fun about a bowl full of stupid little beans... boring, blah, yuck! But, beans have great nutritional value, they are inexpensive and easy to make, and now that I am grown up I can appreciate them.


I've had many opportunities to eat beans at his parent's house. One version my mother in law makes is cowboy beans. She cooks onion and ground beef and then adds it to the pot of beans along with a can of rotel. I've taken that idea and doctored it up into something not only palatable but delicious and oh so easy! Of course if you're feeling particularly productive that day you could fry up some cabbage and potatoes to round out the perfect comfort meal!!

Cowboy Beans

Ingredients:
1lb bag dried pinto beans
1lb meat (See choices below)
1/2 can rotel (again, see below)
1 tbsp salt (plus more to taste)
2 tsp pepper
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp red pepper flakes
8-12 cups water
Directions:
Rinse and sort beans (yep, I've found rocks in there before). Then put everything in a crock pot, give it a stir and turn on low for 8-10 hours. When you get home dinner is magically ready and you can spend more time on the stuff you love... like blogging!!
Meat choices: Steak, brisket, sausage, ground beef w/onions, etc.

Note: Any time we eat steak, brisket, or BBQ... you can pretty much guess what we're having for dinner the next night. Also, when I find hamburger on sale I'll buy at least 10lbs, pre cook it (some with onions, some without) and separate it into 1lb bags to freeze. Perfect for meals like this!

Rotel: a whole can of rotel is a little too spicy for the kids so I use half and put the other half in a small freezer bag for future use... such as chicken spaghetti.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Italian Feast Part 1 - Spaghetti alla Carbonara

Ok, so I can't just make Cannoli, nope... gotta have something to go with it and since I was making Cannoli... I decided to do a whole Italian Feast! After seeing this recipe on Living in the Kitchen with Puppies , I knew I had to make it. Spaghetti alla Carbonara Recipe courtesy Nigella Lawson Ingredients: 1 pound spaghetti 2 cups cubed pancetta rind removed (I used bacon) 2 teaspoons olive oil 1/4 cup dry white wine or vermouth 4 eggs 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan 1/4 cup heavy cream Freshly ground black pepper Freshly ground nutmeg Directions Put a large pan of water on to boil for the pasta. In another large pan that will fit the pasta later, cook the pancetta cubes in the oil until crispy but not crunchy. Pour over the white wine or vermouth and let it bubble away so that, after a few minutes, you have a small amount of salty winey syrup left. Take the pan off the heat. In a bowl, beat together the eggs, Parmesan, cream, and pepper. Cook the pasta accor

Fried Ravioli

Benvenuto Giada! I am so excited that Giada is the chef we will be cooking from for the next six months over at I Heart Cooking Clubs!!! She is my absolute favorite celebrity chef. Over the years I've made many of her recipes and can't wait to make more. After browsing through some of her recipes over at the Food Network web site I settled on a simple but oh so delicious recipe of fried ravioli. They were so good! And easy... and GOOD!! Mmmm, just looking at the picture makes me wish I has more. Ingredients: Olive oil, for frying 1 cup buttermilk 2 cups Italian-style bread crumbs 1 box store bought cheese ravioli 1/4 cup freshly grated Parmesan Marinara sauce, heated, for dipping Directions: Pour enough olive oil into a large frying pan to reach a depth of 2 inches. Heat the oil over medioum heat until a deep-fry thermometer registers 325 degrees. While the oil is heating, put the buttermilk and the bread crumbs in separate shallow bowls. Dip ravioli in buttermilk to coat, al

Fried Cabbage

Happy New Year Y'all! It's a tradition to eat black eyed peas and cabbage on new years... for luck and prosperity.  I did a little research this morning and this is what I found. For New Years, pork represents health and wealth, and continued prosperity. Some say also that a pig also represents progress - since pigs pretty much can't just look backward without completely turning around, so a pig represents forward progress. The tradition of black-eyed peas for southerners is believed to have originated back during Civil War times when Sherman's soldiers raided southern homes, taking virtually all of the food and burning the crops, but mostly ignoring the fields of black-eyed peas, because they thought them to be food for the livestock and of no value otherwise. As one of the few food sources left to sustain the people and the southern soldiers, those black-eyed peas came to represent good fortune. The black-eyed peas represent coins, cabbage represents paper mon