I can't cook dry beans.
I have tried using dry beans to make Chili many, many times, but the beans are always a little crunchy still by the time the chili is ready. I'm sure I'm doing something wrong but I can't figure out what it is. For all those seasoned bean cookers out there, I'll describe what I do and maybe you can tell me what my flaw is.
I've tried soaking the beans overnight. I've also soaked them starting the morning of cooking, which translates to about 6-8 hours of soaking. I've even soaked them for days at a time in the fridge. After soaking I'll dump the beans in with the rest of the chili fixings (meat, tomatoes, spices, etc.) and let simmer for an hour to 2 hours. After 2 hours I taste the crunchy beans and simmer for another hour. With beans still crunchy but stomachs growling, we give in and eat the chili.
I've tried making the Chili in a Crockpot and cooking it for 4 or 5 hours. Doesn't work.
We enjoy eating Chili and I would like to be able to use the dry beans I have, but I can't figure out how to cook them!
This may seem like an obvious step to others, but apparently not to me, so please humor me. After soaking the beans, do you have to simmer the beans on their own in water and cook them before adding them to the chili? This would make sense and would most likely fix my crunchy bean problem. But I feel like it should be easier than that. I think I should be able to add the beans right after soaking and having them cook with the chili. Otherwise, I spend all day soaking beans and hours cooking them and making chili and it seem like too much time spent for a simple bowl meal. I guess this is why people just use canned beans. They come out of the can perfectly tender already!
So help me out here! Do I need to cook the beans first? Am I not soaking the beans correctly? Tell me what I am doing wrong.
8 comments:
I have no clue either if that makes you feel any better.
My mother-in-law gifted me a pressure cooker, which cooks dry beans (without presoaking) in about 20 minutes. I'm sorry I can't you help you out, I cheat. Maybe put a pressure cooker on your future wishlist...
You can't start cooking with dry beans. Certain things like tomatoes will keep them from getting soft. You must completely cook the beans before using them in recipes. I soak my beans over night then cook them in the crockpot during the morning. Once they're soft you can add the rest of your chili stuff and cook it for the rest of the afternoon.
Amen to the above.
soak them overnight and then drain them in the morning. in new water, simmer them for 1.5 hours. then drain them again and add them to the chili. salt keeps them tough so make sure you dont put them with salt until they are fully cooked
You can cut down on time by shortening the soaking step. If I want to make sure I have really soft beans, sometimes I'll cook them in the crockpot over night. I just soak them in really hot water for a few hours (warming the water by replacing it a few times) and them dump them into the crockpot to soften while I sleep. In general, older beans take longer to get soft. I've seen tips before about putting baking soda and/or salt in the soaking water for particularly curmudgeonly beans but letting them soften in a crockpot for hours has always worked for us.
I soak and cook beans the same way Ashley described. Soak the beans overnight and put them in the crock pot in the morning. By afternoon, they are usually ready to add the rest of the ingredients.
Ha ha! Neil said "curmudgeonly".
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