Beans: A Love/Hate Relationship

For as long as I can remember, I have disliked beans. Much to my mother's chagrin, if I even suspected beans might be a part of the dish set before me, I quickly went on a search and destroy mission before they could ruin the rest of my food.

This continued into adulthood. Enter my quest for a frugal, more natural lifestyle. I remember the day my relationship with beans took a turn for the better. I was reading The Tightwad Gazette, aka the frugalista bible, and there it was in print: You will never be able to hit a rock-bottom grocery budget unless you incorporate dried beans into your diet. (My paraphrase)

If anything could convince me to give beans another try, this was it! That statement hit me right in the pocket book!

I started with lentils because they are so small and tend to take on the flavor and the consistency of whatever food you combine them with. I hit a roadblock, however, when I couldn't think of anything else to do with them besides putting them in soup. When an occasional idea did come to mind, I would end up not wanting to mess with re-hydrating the beans (even through this isn't that difficult with lentils) and would end up just leaving them out. Don't laugh. I know that re-hydrating lentils is no big deal, but you have to understand that my brain is still looking for any little excuse to forego those little buggers!

As I began reading about homemade convenience foods, I saw that a number of families create their own "canned" beans buy cooking dried beans in bulk and freezing them so that they can throw them into whatever is on the stove without any prior planning. I decided to give this a try by following directions I found here. I am looking forward to adding my pre-cooked beans into not only soups, but also skillet dishes, casseroles, and ground beef. This will stretch and add nutrition to many of the common meals we fix. What's not to love about the convenience of canned beans at the price of dried?

Do you like beans? How do you prepare them? What foods do you like to freeze and have on hand?