2For66

April 15, 2017

I know I’ve blogged about pinto and refried beans a lot this winter and early spring – but I’ve just been so happy about my results. Plus I got a new flash modifier for my camera this week and the new Instant Pot IP-Duo 60 Plus pressure cooker; so I knew I had to take some pictures – and if I take some pictures I have to share.

My sister-in-law and brother-in-law were hosting an Easter eve dinner. My brother-in-law does a phenomenal job with roasting and baking. He brings a deep-fried turkey to Thanksgiving and this year he made the standing rib roast for Christmas. He has a new Traeger pellet smoker that he’s been playing with and offered to cook up a roast beef on that. So, I only had to cook a side dish. After eating refried beans from this pinto bean recipe I thought it would be good to see how they stand on their own. Let’s see.

There are not a lot of ingredients for this dish and if you have a pressure cooker you can get them done start to finish in a bit over an hour (after an overnight soak of the beans).

Let’s get the ingredients invited to the party. One pound of pintos which have been brined overnight in 3 Tablespoons of table salt and 3 quarts of water. One and a half cups of (preferably homemade chicken stock), half an onion, salt, chili powder, a few springs of fresh oregano, four smashed cloves of garlic and some cumin powder. We’ll also add water to cover later.

As I said prep is easy. We cut the onion across the equator and use the root end whole. We peel and lightly smash four cloves of garlic. A few spices and we are ready to go. I had whole cumin seed so I pulled down my mortar and pestle to grind them.

After the minimal prep

Everyone into the pool. I added couple of cups of water to make sure everything was covered. The bay leaves look a little beat up – that’s because I buy them bulk and they get a little torn up when I put them in my spice jar – no worries they provide the same taste and they aren’t part of the presentation.

Check the seals and vents on the pressure cooker, twist on the lid and cook for 18 minutes with at least a 10 minute natural pressure release before doing a quick release.

I like the display of the new Instant Pot IP Duo 60 Plus. There are icons at the top of the display letting you know what is going on.

After the cooking and pressure release, we pull the onion half, oregano, bay leaves, and garlic from the pot and serve up a nice bowl of beans.

Now, normally I take these the next step to fry them in lard with some onion and jalapeño, but they do perfectly well on their won. You can find my recipe here. That recipe is divided into two parts: one for the beans (as seen here) and one for the refried beans. Just use the ingredients under “Beans” and the “Soak the Beans” and “Pressure Cook the Beans” steps. I doubled the recipe here by using one pound of beans instead of one cup (a cup is a little less than half a pound).  My cooking instructions originally came from the awesome Mike Vrobel of Dad Cooks Dinner. But my ingredients are a bit different.