Budget-minded healthy cooks bring back the bean

Dried beans, the once-humble legumes that have been considered magical since the tale of Jack and the Beanstalk, are rising to superstar status as chefs and home cooks rediscover their value as a cheap, healthy protein, especially as Americans are eating less meat.
For health as well as environmental reasons, in a supporting role or in the center of the plate, people are eating more beans, says Linda Smithson, cofounder of FoodWatch.

Garbanzo, navy, black, cannellini, no matter the variety, these old reliables all satisfy the growing number of people choosing or requiring a specialized diet: vegan, vegetarian, diabetic, gluten-free, lactose intolerant, or the ever popular flexitarian - choosing to be any of the above when the mood strikes.

Brad Spence, chef at Amis in Center City, is just back from Italy where beans were on every menu. Upon his return he re-created a dish for his restaurant menu based on one of the most delicious things he ever tasted, a bean and barley soup. Markets are responding with an increasingly multihued rainbow of beans from the tiniest red lentil to speckled anasazi to giant white coco beans.

Dried beans or pulses are nutritionally dense, a great source of dietary fiber and complex carbohydrates with a guilt-free carbon footprint.

And if that isn't enough, beans are incredibly versatile. Almost all are good stewed, mashed, refried, and layered, and a few can even be candied and served for snacks or dessert.

Some are best simmered gently, one or two are regularly fermented, still others are most often baked.

While canned beans are a great convenience, cooking dried beans has many advantages. Dried beans cost less per serving than any other protein. If purchased from the bulk aisle, little or no packaging is needed.

But, most important, starting with dried beans gives a home cook the most control over the flavor and texture of the finished dish, as dried beans take up flavors exceptionally well as they cook.

Adding a bay leaf, a piece of kombu, a clove of garlic, a heel of Parmesan, a smoked turkey wing or leg or other bone to the pot while cooking will add flavor to the beans. Ubiquitous white beans, whether white navy, baby lima or cannellini, easily absorb the flavors of roasted vegetables, dried rosemary, and stock to make a tender vegetable one-dish dinner.