Beans

The rule of thumb for replacing the fat in your recipes with a bean puree is to match the color of beans to the recipe. So, the following chocolate recipes use black beans. A chocolate chip cookie or peanut butter cookie would be better with a white bean or pinto bean puree. I have heard some recipes that don't turn out well with the puree, will do well with half puree and half oil/butter. Even if you replace half of a recipe's butter, think of the fat and calories you cut out and the fiber you add by making this switch! It is also a creative way to still be able to bake if you were to live off your food supply and ran out of fats in your storage.

Low-Fat Peanut Butter Brownies
1 pkg. (18.3 oz.) Brownie Mix
1-1/3 C. Water
1/3 C. Oil (1/3 C. Black Bean Puree)
2 Eggs (2 T. Dry Egg Powder + ¼ C. Water)
1 C. Peanut Butter Chips
Preheat oven to 350°F. Mix ingredients until just moistened. Pour into greased
pan and bake immediately. Check brownie mix package for baking times for
your pan.
**Tip** Replacing all of the oil with black beans will create a cake like brownie.
If you like your brownies chewy, only replace half of the oil with mashed black
beans.

Low-Fat Devil’s Food Bundt Cake (this is the cake I served)
1 pkg. (18.25 oz.) Devil’s Food Cake Mix
1-1/3 C. Water
½ C. Oil (1/2 C. Black Bean Puree)
3 Eggs (1/3 Dry Egg Powder + 2/3 C. Water)
Preheat Oven to 350°F. Grease sides of Bundt® pan. Blend ingredients in large
bowl at low speed until moistened about 3 seconds. Beat at medium speed for
2 minutes. Pour batter in pan and bake immediately. Check cake mix box for
specific baking times. Allow cake to cool in pan for 5 minutes before turning
out onto cooling rack. Dust with powdered sugar when completely cool.

**Black Bean Puree**
Cooked Black Beans
Reserved Cooking Water
-or one can Black Beans
Blend Black Beans and enough water (or entire
can of beans) in blender to make a thick paste.

Wondering if you should store dry beans, but not sure what to do with them if you do?? Here's a little blip from www.everydayfoodstorage.net that you could print out and tape to your barrel of beans and forget about until wartime ;) Or I guess you could use it... I'm just so sold on 50 cent case lot canned beans!!!

Cooking your DRY Beans:
Quick Soaking – For each pound of beans, add 10 cups hot water; heat to boiling and let boil 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from heat, cover and set aside for at least 1 hour.

Overnight Soak – For each pound (2 cups) dry-packaged beans, add 10 cups cold water, then let soak overnight, or at least 8 hours.

Cooking Beans - Once your beans have soaked and tripled in size, it’s time to cook them. The most important step in this process is to drain off the soaking water and rinse the beans before cooking to help decrease the gas side effect. Depending on the bean variety, it will take 30 minutes to 2 hours to cook. Make sure and check the package for more specific directions. You’ll know the beans are done when they are tender, but not overcooked. If your beans have been sitting in your food storage for a long time you will need to cook them for a longer period of time. Cool the beans in their cooking liquid if you are not adding them to another liquid, like a soup, when they are done cooking.