A few weeks ago Emily of Daily Garnish fame posted a delicious looking enchilada recipe using black beans and butternut squash. Butternut squash is one of my all-time favorite fall and winter foods, so I bookmarked it and waited with baited breath for one to show up in our CSA box. Well, last Friday, I opened the box and squealed when I saw the squash. I am pretty sure my husband thought I saw a spider or something, because he asked what was wrong. LOL!
I was so excited to eat, I nearly forgot to snap a photo, so I had to use the instagram I used in a tweet.
To make, I followed Emily’s Roasted Butternut Squash and Black Bean Enchilada recipe. I also made the homemade sauce she used. Both were easy and delicious. The only thing I might consider doing differently is leaving out the cinnamon or reducing it even further. Maybe my squash was not big enough, but the cinnamon seemed a little strong to me. It might also have appeared that way to me, because I REALLY love the flavor of butternut squash “naked” (so to speak).
Also, in full disclosure, for whatever reason, my son decided he did not like the enchilada. He only wanted to eat the squash and bean mixture on the inside. No big deal. Next time I will save him some to the side. 
(I served it with some guacamole and chips on the side, using the tomato from our CSA box, which was not ideal, but it worked.)
When I first started cooking vegetarian at least once a week, I went in search of a few recipes so that my vegetarian meal wasn’t always some sort of pasta dish. So my first stop was my trust red Betty Crocker cookbook where I found the recipe for California Black Bean Burgers. And although mine have never looked quite like what they show, we have always found them tasty. It is a go-to meal in the summers because it is quick and easy and all the ingredients are easy to keep on hand.
Ingredients:
1 can (15 ounces) black beans, undrained
1 can (4 ounces) chopped green chilies, undrained
1 cup plan dry bread crumbs
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 large egg, beaten
1/4 cup yellow cornmeal
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
Directions:
1. Place beans in food processor or blender. Cover and process until slightly mashed, remove from food processor. Mix beans, chilies, bread crumbs, chili powder and egg. Shape mixture into 6 patties, each about ½ inch thick. Coat each patty with cornmeal.
2. Heat oil in 10-inch skillet over medium heat. Cook patties in oil 5 to 10 minutes, turning once, until crisp and thoroughly cooked on both sides.
I often don’t use the corn meal and use olive oil to cook them instead of vegetable oil. I then put them on those thin hamburger buns and they look like this:
I have found that with a thick bun, the bread taste outweighs the taste of the beans, which I don’t’ prefer. And my husband actually doesn’t eat them with a bun at all. I then put on tomatoes, hummus and mustard, which I know to some would be a weird combination.
However you prefer to eat them, I think you will enjoy a quick, healthy way to eat a vegetarian meal.
Enjoy,
Another soup recipe from me today. This recipe is actually a slow cooker recipe, but I find a lot of slow cooker recipes I use make things too mushy. So I decided to use the stove top and see how this one would turn out. The recipe is from A Year of Slow Cooking. Here were my simplifications/modifications:
Ingredients:
1 pound chicken
2 cans, drained and rinsed ( or 1 cup dried black beans, make sure you soak them properly before use )
4 cups chicken broth
1 cup frozen corn
1 jar prepared salsa (16 oz)
1 1/2 tsp cumin
1 cup sour cream (to stir in at the end)
Directions:
1. Drain and rinse the beans. Add to the pot. Put in the chicken, and add the broth and salsa. Pour in the corn, and add the cumin. Stir, but don’t disturb the beans—let them stay at the bottom of the pot, closest to the heating element.
2. Cover and cook on medium for 1 hour.
3. Stir in the 1 cup of sour cream before serving.
I omitted a few ingredients, just because I didn’t have them around and never bothered with the blender part. I also added more sour cream, and actually found this dairy free version which was very good:
I thought the soup was very good, not too spicy, whcih is big for my kids. And I ate leftovers a few days afterwards for lunch and the soup was still good!
A lady I worked with in Tulsa made this great southwest style soup for a work function, and I fell in love. I have been able to modify it in every country we have lived in, which is to say the recipe is quite flexible. Usually I would serve it with cornbread, but we did not have any in the house, nor the ingredients to make some, so I thought quinoa would add some nice heft to the recipe. You could also serve it over corn chips or something similar by draining more of the juices off of the ingredients or not adding tomato juice.
The Players
1 cup rinsed quinoa
1 1/2 cup water
1 cup black beans
1 cup ranch style beans
1 cup corn
2 cans Rotel
1 quart tomato juice
1 package taco seasoning
1 package powdered ranch dressing mix
The Fun
1. Boil water. Add quinoa. Cover and reduce heat to simmer for 15 minutes. Once done, remove from heat and allow to sit for 5 minutes before fluffing with a fork.
2. While the quinoa is cooking, dump the rest of the ingredients in to a large sauce pan and cover. Allow to heat on medium, stirring occasionally. I try not to bring it to a boil, as I am impatient in waiting for it to cool.
3. Spoon some quinoa in to a bowl and then ladle the soup over the top.
I tend to mix mine up, while others in the family prefer to scoop to the bottom to get the quinoa. You can top with cheese, sour cream, avacado, etc, but we were low on groceries, so we ate it plain this last time.
We have been cutting back big time on dairy in our home, and my favorite black bean dip calls for sour cream. What’s a woman to do but start experimenting. I am not sure I would say this is 100% IT, but it is awfully dang good. I just about licked the bowl.
The Ingredients
2 cups cooked black beans
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
¼ cup tahini
1 teaspoon ground cumin
2 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon ume vinegar or 2 teaspoons lemon juice (or to taste)
½ jalapeno pepper, seeded and roughly chopped
½ small-medium onion, roughly chopped
The Directions
Combine all ingredients in container for immersion blender. Pulse until smooth and all ingredients are combined. Transfer to a serving bowl. Serve right away or refrigerate over night.
I served this with a variety of vegetables, as well as some corn chips and pita chips. It was delicious and would also work well in tacos. In the “not IT’ part of this dip, when I make it again, I will add cilantro and more onion. Also, allowing it to sit overnight definitely helps blend the flavors.
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