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Dinner With Depth (Courtesy of Legumes) 🫘
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Hi Reader, When I was a kid, beans were not optional. Ho-no! They appeared with the regularity of my godfather's Saturday-night stock car race. White beans with pork, black-eyed peas with tuna, lentils simmered until they slumped into submission. My mother insisted they were “good for you,” which, in childhood, was code for “culinary punishment.” But somewhere along the way, I stopped sulking and started swooning. Maybe it was my aunt Irene's feijoada, a slow-cooked bacchanal of beans, sausage, and whatever pork parts happened to be lurking in the freezer. Maybe it was the humble lentil soup that saw me through my starving-writer years in New York (with more lentils than ambition in my cupboards). Whatever the turning point, I finally understood: beans aren’t filler. They’re flavor, history, and comfort disguised in humble little packages. How to Cook Beans Like a Pro (Without Tears)
WHAT'S INSIDE...
Slow Cooked Lamb & Cannellini Beans
This slow cooked lamb and cannellini beans is an oh-so-comforting stew made with tender braised boneless lamb, white beans, vegetables and topped with parsley and lemon gremolata. The perfect thing for winter.☞ Try this recipeRoasted Sweet Potatoes & Chickpeas
These roasted sweet potatoes and chickpeas are cooked on a sheet pan until tender and tossed in coconut milk and lime dressing. An easy dinner☞ Try this recipeSautéed Bacon, Mushrooms & Lentils⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.59 from 12 votes
Sautéed bacon, mushrooms, and lentils is mostly healthy but also has an extravagant amount of bacon added. Brown lentils and mushrooms are full of nutrition and flavor, so why not indulge?☞ Try this recipeKung Pao Chicken With Peanuts⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 from 11 votes
This Kung Pao chicken is an easy, authentic Chinese dish made with crisp chicken breast, peanuts, and chile peppers in a sauce made from soy sauce, black vinegar, and sesame oil.☞ Try this recipeRed Chicken Posole
This red chicken pozole, or red chicken pozole, is an easy Mexican soup that's made with chicken, hominy, and dried chiles. It's a soupy, stewy, satisfying supper.☞ Try this recipeWhite Beans & Tuscan Kale
Beans are a pantry staple in most Italian homes, a versatile and filling ingredient Italians rely on the way Americans use potatoes— or even pasta. They’re simple, easy to dress up or down, and a cost-effective way to round out a meal. This takes a while to cook, but it’s almost all hands-off time, and because it makes a large batch, you can serve it for several meals throughout the week.☞ Try this recipeOld-Fashioned Minestrone Soup
This old-fashioned minestrone soup is chock-full of carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, kale, zucchini, beans, and pasta...but gets an unexpected drizzle of pesto that transforms a frugal veggie-bin soup into something special.☞ Try this recipeBraised Cranberry Beans With Chorizo
These braised cranberry beans with chorizo are a comforting one-pot meal that can be made in your Instant Pot.☞ Try this recipePotato & Chickpea Stew
This potato and chickpea stew, made with potatoes, canned chickpeas, tomatoes, bell peppers, and spinach, is a hearty and healthy and vegetarian weeknight dinner that's both easy to make and pretty darn satisfying, too.☞ Try this recipePan-Fried Green Beans⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.73 from 11 votes
These easy pan-fried green beans are blanched, then given a quick turn in a skillet with garlic butter, and finished with a sprinkle of salt. Simple and classic.☞ Try this recipe |
Leite's Culinaria
Why, hello! Leite's Culinaria is the James Beard Award-winning site that helps home cooks and bakers put dinner on the table and laughs in the kitchen. Hungry for more? Join more than 30,000 food lovers and subscribe.
Hi Reader, I’ve always thought chicken gets a bad rap. People talk about it the way they talk about wallpaper—necessary, but boring. Ever since The One came on the scene, though, chicken has never been bland. There's his quick weekday roast he makes when he has three minutes and an attitude, the jug-cooked chicken from my cookbook that he swears could cure heartbreak, and a simple and simply superb Sunday supper: his brined roasted chicken that sits on a raft of carrots, onions, and potatoes...
Hi Reader, Every year when the first chill sneaks into the air, I’m hit with the same scent—apples and cinnamon—and suddenly I’m thirty-something again, standing in my postage-stamp-size kitchen trying to impress a man I’d met only weeks before. (Spoiler: I succeeded. He’s still here, three decades later, eating the evidence.) The One in my impossibly small kitchen in Brooklyn, tucked under a staircase. That first autumn, way back in 1993, was our season of Love Food. We knew nothing about...
Hi Reader, Open my refrigerator on any given day and you’ll find two things: (1) far too many jars, and (2) Alan sighing dramatically every time he can’t find the milk behind them. But here’s the thing—those jars are my secret weapons.There's tomato jam. Spooned into squat little jars, it looks innocent enough, but one taste and suddenly grilled cheese became a culinary event. And red pepper paste and garlic confit. And let's not forget milk mayonnaise (yes, mayonnaise made with milk—don’t...