recipe for Mexican pinto beans??

I have made all sorts of attempts to make the soupy-ish pintos that one gets at Mexican restos at all levels. None has been anywhere near as satisfying as what I get in even the simplest bodega. Does anyone have a rock-solid, can't miss, knock-down drag-out recipe?

I've bought a couple of pounds of Rancho Gordo's pintos just for this attempt.

TIA!

Geo

I'm a fan of the Cowboy Beans from Rick Bayless:

http://www.rickbayless.com/recipe/cowboy-beans/

Tnx GP! I have a lot of respect for Bayless, so I'll most certainly consider his recipe strongly. Two things I noted: he did not salt the beans until after they were finished; and he did not soak the beans. I'm puzzled, post-Kenji, by both of those.

Geo

Geo wrote:Tnx GP! I have a lot of respect for Bayless, so I'll most certainly consider his recipe strongly. Two things I noted: he did not salt the beans until after they were finished; and he did not soak the beans. I'm puzzled, post-Kenji, by both of those.

You don't need to soak fresh beans. Your brandy-new Rancho Gordos will be fine. He probably learned how to make beans one way and that's it. I tend to salt them part-way through, splitting the difference.

Good point leek. I got some eye-of-the-goat beans in the same shipment a couple of weeks ago, and used them two days ago with some leftover rib tips. Put them in well-salted water, brought to the boil, shut the flame, then let them languish for two hours before gently simmering them for the requisite time. They were glorious! Whole, entire, delicate throughout, and oh! so tasty.

Tnx!

Geo

I always salt from the get-go because I think it makes the beans taste better, and doing so does not inhibit their cooking at all. 2 teaspoons of kosher salt for 1 pound of beans seems to be just about right, if you cook the beans with just enough water to cover them. If you're aiming for a final product with more pot liquor, you may want to use a bit more salt.

Soaking is not necessary, and I often don't bother -- especially with RG beans -- but you'll get more of a textural contrast between the skins and the interiors if you soak them before cooking. The shorter cooking time required with soaked beans generally results in beans that are less mushy.

=R=

Geo wrote:Two things I noted: he did not salt the beans until after they were finished; and he did not soak the beans.

Did we read different recipes?
http://www.rickbayless.com/recipe/cowboy-beans/
Not only did the linked recipe salt the beans prior to simmering there was bacon which contains salt.

As Ronnie S has pointed out a number of times quality younger dried beans such as Rancho Gordo do not necessarily need to be soaked. Here is a link to Ronnie's basic bean technique, he does not soak (rancho gorodo) and salts prior to cooking.

Also, the old school way of thinking is that salting beans prior to simmering toughens the beans. I've not cooked enough beans to form a valid opinion on the matter. Though as this is the internet I'm not sure why I'm letting that stop me.

Rancho Gordo addresses some of these points on their web site under Basic Bean Cooking

Gary, I didn't read Bayless' recipe, I just watched his video. In the video, IIRC, he doesn't either soak or salt. I might have missed it, tho'.

Kenji's experiments seem to pretty strongly indicate that salting at the beginning is useful.

Geo

https://www.seriouseats.com/2016/09/salt-beans-cooking-soaking-water-good-or-bad.html

I just put this recipe together, and there is salt that goes in right with the beans and water (read the directions )

I'm using RG Good Mother Stallard (similar to pintos, but a bit meatier texture). Will report back.

Water.
When we moved Winfield we were on a community well. Water was very hard and had a lot of sulfur. I could not cook beans or split peas. They would never soften, regardless of how long I cooked them. After boiling split peas for hours, I tried blending them in a food processor. The result was a gritty puree. We solved the problem by getting water from my mother-in-law (who incidentally grew up in Mexico.) She got Lake Michigan water and legumes softened as expected. Since then we have gotten Lake Michigan water in Winfield and I can now cook with tap water.

If your beans and peas are not softening as expected, look to your water.

FWIW, my pinto bean process is:
- Inspect the beans on a sheet pan and remove bean size bits of mud and rocks.
- Rinse the beans in a colander.
- Put the beans in a non-reactive pot (I use SS or anodized aluminum - my mother-in-law used a clay pot glazed on the inside.) with 2C water to 1C beans. I add some salt and a few bay leaves at this point.
- Bring to a boil and cut back to just keep a few bubbles going. Add water if necessary to keep them covered.
- Cook until they are the consistency you prefer.

HTH,
hank

Edit: For those not near the great lakes, Lake Michigan is about 135 ppm hardness. That's neither particularly hard nor soft.

Good point about the water HankB. We're on a well here, but the water is quite soft: soap and shampoo lathers up quite well. Iron, tho', so it stinks.

City water in Whitewater WI is really hard, nearly everyone in town has a softener. We lived there for 3 years and I never got used to the softened water, but at least you could cook beans with it.

Geo

For me, with my beans, the Rick Bayless recipe went right over to baked beans flavor. I added about 1/4 cup molasses to it, and now it's just right as baked beans. But not necessarily what I think was originally wanted.

leek wrote:For me, with my beans, the Rick Bayless recipe went right over to baked beans flavor. I added about 1/4 cup molasses to it, and now it's just right as baked beans. But not necessarily what I think was originally wanted.

Bummer. I see no need whatsoever to make sweet beans since I don't like them and there's no end to the opportunities for procuring them. I'm sorry it didn't work out. If I'd read the recipe I would have mentioned it. As you know, a little molasses goes a long way.

=R=

ronnie_suburban wrote:

leek wrote:For me, with my beans, the Rick Bayless recipe went right over to baked beans flavor. I added about 1/4 cup molasses to it, and now it's just right as baked beans. But not necessarily what I think was originally wanted.

Bummer. I see no need whatsoever to make sweet beans since I don't like them and there's no end to the opportunities for procuring them. I'm sorry it didn't work out. If I'd read the recipe I would have mentioned it. As you know, a little molasses goes a long way.

To clarify - I added the molasses once I tasted them and thought baked beans, not mexican-ish beans.

It will be fine. I'm having family over in 2 weeks, so I just froze them and they'll be good for that occasion.

Huh. Sweet/bbq/baked beans I've got down pretty pat. I used to make 25-gal batches of them for our winery's fest weekends, to go along with our smoked sausages and chicken, so I've had a bit of practice. : )

And K-Paul's recipe years ago solved my red beans and rice jones.

So my only missing bean food group is Mexi-pintos...

Still looking, folks. Candidates??

Tnx for your help so far.

Geo

Geo wrote:Huh. Sweet/bbq/baked beans I've got down pretty pat. I used to make 25-gal batches of them for our winery's fest weekends, to go along with our smoked sausages and chicken, so I've had a bit of practice. : )

And K-Paul's recipe years ago solved my red beans and rice jones.

So my only missing bean food group is Mexi-pintos...

Still looking, folks. Candidates??

Tnx for your help so far.

Geo

Try this, Geo . . .

1 pound pinto beans (pre-soaked)
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon cumin, freshly ground
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 tablespoon oil (corn or olive or rendered bacon fat or whatever you prefer)
1 Mexican bay leaf (optional)
1 jalapeno pepper, slit down its side (optional)
1 serrano pepper, slit down its side (optional)
Water to cover

Sautee the onion and garlic in the oil until soft in a large, coverable pot. Add the pre-soaked beans, salt and cumin (and bay leaf if you're including it). Cover the beans by 1 inch with cold water. Cover the pot tightly, raise the heat to high and bring to a boil for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, reduce to a simmer, add the peppers if you're using them, and place the lid back on the pot, leaving it slightly ajar. Maintain a gentle simmer for 1.5-2 hours, after which the beans will be ready. If you need to add more water along the way, just make sure it's already to temperature. You can start checking the beans for doneness at the 1.5 hour mark.

This method/recipe has always worked for me, though I prefer it with black beans.

=R=

Literally about to make this recipe for charro beans in under an hour (with soaked Rancho Gordo pintos, no less). The recipe looks pretty identical to the Bayless one posted above. I'll post a follow-up about how it comes out. For all the times I've cooked Mexican-ish beans with tomatoes (which is a bunch), they seem to come out tasting pretty much the same. I don't think I've ever have them veer over to baked beans territory. But I often will amp up flavors I like (like cumin) after tasting.

leek wrote:To clarify - I added the molasses once I tasted them and thought baked beans, not mexican-ish beans.

Right, no molasses in the original Bayless Cowboy Beans recipe. Either that or the Kenji recipe will make tasty Mexican style beans.

I've done the Bayless Chowboy beans more than once, its tasty, easy and about 8-zillion Mexican grandmothers, aunties and home cooks all over the world do a version every day.

gastro gnome wrote:Literally about to make this recipe for charro beans in under an hour (with soaked Rancho Gordo pintos, no less). The recipe looks pretty identical to the Bayless one posted above. I'll post a follow-up about how it comes out. For all the times I've cooked Mexican-ish beans with tomatoes (which is a bunch), they seem to come out tasting pretty much the same. I don't think I've ever have them veer over to baked beans territory. But I often will amp up flavors I like (like cumin) after tasting.

These tasted nothing like baked beans. Recommended.

Geo wrote: Does anyone have a rock-solid, can't miss, knock-down drag-out recipe?

I've bought a couple of pounds of Rancho Gordo's pintos just for this attempt.

TIA!

Geo

This is my neighbor's recipe and is authentic at least from her point of view.

"Put a lot of olive oil in a pan and heat until searing hot. Place one whole can of beans with juice in oil and let it simmer until it boils up, then mash. Add salt to taste." The end.

Love it, Food Nut! My dearly belovéd, but now gone, next door neighbor was Nicaraguan. He made beans and rice every day of his life. One of his faves was "moors and christians" (sorry, I can't remember the Español), a 50/50 combo of black beans and pintos. He poured both cans into the oily pan, added a bit of this and that, turned it on low, and cooked for hours, until the bottom half inch was solid, browned, crispy, delicious beans.

Sometimes the simplest is the elegantest.

Geo

I have really liked these beans, they have no tomato and no meat, though:
https://www.ranchogordo.com/blogs/recip ... illo-beans

leek wrote:I have really liked these beans, they have no tomato and no meat, though:
https://www.ranchogordo.com/blogs/recip ... illo-beans

I think I tried making this once. They came out tasting more one-note than I was hoping (though I am not positive it was this recipe so I should probably try them again).

I often prefer making beans without meat, but I do think I've noticed that the recipes with meat (including the pintos I made yesterday) tend to come out much more fully flavored than the meat-free versions I've made.

I was surprised at the amount of bacon fat 12 oz of bacon produced in the pintos recipe I made yesterday. The outcome was much more fully flavored (particularly in the heat department) than some of the vegan recipes I make. I'm wondering whether this might have to do with overall composition of the dish and fat-soluble flavors rather than just the presence/absence of meat.

The next time I make vegan or meat-free beans, I may try adding more oil than I normally would to see if that carry through some of the flavors I expect to taste.

Yup, you're onto the secret, gastro gnome. I learned long ago that the crucial rule is:

As go lipids, so goes flavour

Here's a classic paper: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/bk-1978-0075.ch001

Geo

gastro gnome wrote:

leek wrote:I have really liked these beans, they have no tomato and no meat, though:
https://www.ranchogordo.com/blogs/recip ... illo-beans

I think I tried making this once. They came out tasting more one-note than I was hoping (though I am not positive it was this recipe so I should probably try them again).

The home-made adobo saves these, and they turned out nicely for me. But I also used the lighter beans they recommend. The ones I used for the cowboy beans are really heavy.

Geo wrote:As go lipids, so goes flavour

Lard.