Black Bean Soup

As much as I love Thanksgiving, and all of the food that comes with it, it’s nice to change things up a little the week after.  After all of the rich food and dessert last week, something simple is just right this week. 

This also seems to be the time of year when things just keep getting busier, so easy meals are very welcome.  A Crock Pot meal that’s ready and waiting when I get home is perfect. 

I love this recipe for so many reasons.  First of all, it’s delicious.  It’s also very simple to put together in the morning before work, especially if you do the chopping the night before.  The beans don’t have to soak, so that’s one less step.  I think it’s reasonably healthy since it’s vegetarian, and doesn’t have packaged ingredients. 

Black Bean Soup:

16 oz. (1 pound) dried black beans
2 onions, chopped
2 bell peppers, chopped
½ cup firmly packed fresh cilantro leaves
1 Tbsp salt
1 ½ tsp chili powder
1 ½ tsp cumin
½ tsp pepper
4 cloves garlic, pressed
10 cups water

Rinse beans, and place all ingredients in a large slow cooker.  Cover and cook on Low 9 - 10 hours. 

The soup is great on it’s own, but it’s also really good topped with diced onion, avocado, or salsa.  And it pairs well with cornbread. 

Cheap Steak Fajitas

I tried to be clever with the name and play on the word cheapskate, but I’m not entirely sure it works.  These fajitas, however, definitely work.  They’re delicious!  They’re also ridiculously easy to make.

I’ll just go ahead and be honest with you.  The idea for these came from failure.  Lots and lots of failure.  I cannot make beef stew.  I’m not sure what my issue is, but it just doesn’t work for me.  I’ve tried various recipes, and various combinations of recipes.  The best result I’ve had is mostly edible, which is not the description you really want for your meal. 

I have finally decided to give up on making beef stew.  We’ve suffered enough.  Nick was elated when I informed him that I was officially giving up on making beef stew.  He was kind enough to say that I make plenty of other things extremely well, and we’d be fine without beef stew, but his initial reaction was definitely relief.  I can’t blame him. 

Unfortunately, I had purchased a gigantic package of stew beef at Sam’s Club before I decided that making delicious (or even good) beef stew is not something I am capable of.  I froze it in one pound packages, and decided I’d come up with other ways to use it.  This is one of my alternatives, and I’m happy to say that it’s as good as my beef stew is bad. 

Here’s what you need:

1 pound stew beef, cut into bite sized pieces
1 -2 bell peppers, chopped
1 -2 onions, chopped
1 package (1.2 oz) fajita seasoning mix
1.5 tsp lime juice
1/4 cup water
2 Tbsp tequila

The tequila isn’t in the picture because I didn’t think about adding it until I started thinking about having a margarita with my fajitas, and had already taken the picture.  I think you can probably leave it out if you don’t happen to have tequila on hand, but I do think it probably does help to tenderize the meat a little bit.  It’s so good with the tequila, too, so I highly recommend using it.

Combine all of the ingredients in a small slow cooker, and cook on Low for 5 -7 hours, until meat is cooked through, and the vegetables are tender.

It’s going to look a little dry when you mix everything, but resist the temptation to add more liquid. 

There’s a fair amount of sauce with these, so they’re really good served with rice to soak up some of the sauce. 

Serve with any combination of rice, beans, tortillas, lettuce, sour cream, guacamole, etc.

Enjoy!

Italian Black Bean Wraps

It seems that most wraps are kind of southwestern/Mexican style, which is great.  We eat a lot of that kind of food, and really enjoy it.  However, we also love Italian food, so I thought it would be nice to come up with a recipe for some Italian themed wraps. 

These are really, really good.  They’re vegetarian, fairly inexpensive to make, and re-heat very well.  The recipe seems a little time consuming, but the slow cooker does the cooking while you’re away.  You also end up with enough beans leftover to make it a couple more times (which you’ll definitely want to do).

For the beans:

1 pound dry black beans, rinsed
1 large onion, chopped

1 bell pepper, chopped

7 cloves garlic, pressed or chopped

1 Tbsp Italian Seasoning

¼ tsp pepper

2 tsp salt

6.5 cups water

Combine all ingredients and place in a large slow cooker, cover, and cook on Low for seven hours.

For the wraps:

8 burrito size wraps/tortillas (I used the Xtreme WellnessTomato Basil Wraps. They’re really good, and they don’t have soy.  They do seem to be a little sticky, so your wraps will be a little harder to roll up if you use this kind.  You can use any kind, but I’d suggest a flavored wrap.)

1 cup orzo, cooked according to package instructions

2 oz cream cheese

1 cup spaghetti/tomato sauce

2 cups baby spinach, torn into small pieces

2 cups black beans (don’t drain them)

¾ cup shredded Mozzarella Cheese

Place cream cheese in a large glass bowl, and melt in the microwave.  Combine tomato sauce with melted cream cheese.  Stir in spinach and orzo.  Stir in black beans.  Divide mixture among tortillas, roll them up, place in two 9x13 baking dishes, and sprinkle with Mozzarella cheese.  Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.  Enjoy!

You will have four cups of black beans left.  Divide them into two freezer bags (2 cups each) and freeze for later.  Black beans freeze and defrost really well, so you’ll be able to make two more batches of this recipe.