Charro Beans! You'll be hard pressed to find an authentic batch of Charro Beans anywhere north of the border, so it's high time to make your own! Charro roughly translates as cowboy, so these beans have always been associated with ranch lifestyle in Mexico. Luckily for us, you can make a hearty, delicious batch of...
Easy Mexican Recipes Using Beans
Beans are one of the most versatile Mexican ingredients but don't limit them to the side dish realm! You can easily turn them into a full meal if you want to. Keep an eye out for the Molletes and the all-important How To Make Refried Beans.
Black Bean and Corn Salsa
This wildly versatile Black Bean and Corn Salsa will have you dreaming up all sorts of ways to use it: tacos, burritos, breakfast backup?!! And you can easily turn it into a meal with a few additions so it's worth keeping it in mind if your kitchen needs a kickstart. I think it tastes best...
Bean Broth Rice
Sure, you can spend a few hours cooking dried beans from scratch and use the leftover simmering liquid to make a batch of Bean Broth Rice. Or you can simply puree some beans into stock and use that as the cooking liquid for the rice. It's a quick workaround but it still leads to a...
Black Bean and Cheese Tortilla Pockets
These tortilla pockets have lots in common with pupusas, gorditas and tostadas, but they're kind of their own bird. You can definitely put them in the "experimental" category, but I think it's worth keeping the technique in mind as it might save you one day when you are knee deep in masa dough. The original...
Spicy Black Bean and Guacamole Tostadas
These Black Bean and Guacamole Tostadas are the perfect example of Mexican cuisine's generous reward-to-effort ratio. You get so much in return here for doing so little work. And not only that, you'll probably have black bean puree leftovers, which means for the next few days you can whip up killer insta-meals whenever you get...
Black Bean and Rice Cakes with Chipotle Crema
This Black Bean and Rice Cakes recipe is for all of you carnivores out there who can't imagine having good energy throughout the day without eating meat. And by 'you' I guess I mean 'me' because the genesis of this recipe came about when trying to create a beans and rice dish that kept me...
Spicy Black Bean Pizza
This Black Bean Pizza comes with special permission to customize the topping list to your liking. But only if you use plenty of the spicy black bean puree that's underneath all the toppings -- that's the key! It also comes with significantly less guilt than meat-based pizza because of its vegetarian nature, which means it's...
Say Hello to Cranberry Beans
Cranberry beans are a common substitute for pinto beans in some parts of Mexico. I've been looking forward to experimenting with them and finally opened up a few packs that have been sitting on the counter for the past couple weeks. They're hard to come by in my neck of the woods so I ordered some from...
Pinto Bean Soup -- Sopa Tarasca
This Pinto Bean Soup (Sopa Tarasca) has a reward-to-effort ratio that's off the charts. By keeping just a few key ingredients on hand you'll always have the option of turning this popular soup into a whoa-what-is-this meal. Quick summary of instructions: Put bowl of Sopa Tarasca on kitchen table along with spoon, lime wedges, and a quesadilla bursting...
Spicy Black Bean Nachos
It's tough to beat the combo of warm tortilla chips, melted cheese, and spicy black beans. In other words...NACHOS! nachos / nah-cho-zz! / noun 1. tortilla chips topped with melted cheese and warm goopy beans 2. an increasingly popular exclamation used to denote an impending, much deserved reward; similar in use to Yes! or Right on! We're...