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Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Sprouted Refried Beans (Sooooo good!)

I love sprouting! I often forget to sprout ahead of when I want the actual sprouted bean, but sometimes I remember. I wanted to cook some of our 25 pound bag of pinto beans I'd picked up at Costco a few months ago. My friend gave me the best recipe for vegan refried beans and my kids DEVOUR them at coffee hour when ever she brings them, so I got the recipe and it's InstantPot friendly and I got one of those last year and love it. I decided on an 8 quart InstantPot last summer after researching my brains out. Because my year has been so busy I haven't learned how to use it much yet... The Instapot and I are still dating and not in a full time committed relationship yet. But this recipe has helped me warm up to him quite a bit.

I use this sprouting method for all of my beans and our favorite is lentils because they sprout even faster. I have to use this bowl/strainer set up pictured below all the time now. I used to use jars more when we didn't have as many hungry teenagers.

My sprouting set up. The first night I soak beans in a big bowl of water.
In the morning I dump them into my spaghetti strainer and rinse them.
Then I put them into the bowl and put a random lid or a plastic plate
or saran wrap on top to trap in some of the moisture.
I also use sprouting jars (2 qt jars) and a sprouting screen if I'm doing smaller batches.

Can you see the tiny sprouts right in the middle?
I soaked about 5 1/2 cups of beans on Monday night (I think?) and today is Wednesday. This makes a LOT, you won't want this many if you have a smaller family. It nearly fills up my 8 qt pot once they are all cooked up. I knew I'd like to have a fasting/vegan food on Wednesday that the kids would gobble up and this is CHEAP and good for them especially when sprouted. When you sprout grains and legumes it removes the bad stuff (I forget the science name) on the outside that naturally preserves the grain and beans from bugs...but it doesn't let our bodies absorb the vitamins in the grain. So if you ONLY soak them for 12 hours you're helping your family out a ton. Sprouting it it starts to change the chemistry and turns it from grain/legume into a vegetable and makes it much healthier, upping the vitamins, nutrients and sometimes the protein. Amazing stuff.

Anytime after the initial 12 hour soak you can cook your beans, but if you rinse them once in the morning and once at night they'll start growing and then you can cook them as healthy little plants! You'll notice a considerable reduction in gas in the family if you eat a lot of beans and some people who can't eat beans at all because of gastrointestinal issues can eat these just fine. After you sprout you can cook any of your beans any way. But we love this way!

The handsome 8 qt InstantPot containing the beans, onions,
cumin and salt. Does not yet have salsa or water.

Turning it on is no small feat! I use the beans setting and put it for 20 minutes.
I think it should work for any soaked beans. This will PRESSURE COOK your beans...
so if you don't have a handsome InstantPot you can cook them on the stove
in a traditional manner in a normal pot for a much longer number of minutes...
you'll have to figure that one out. Basically you don't want them crunchy.

Note, my fingers are pushing the lever into the "pressurized" position.
Don't let this recipe sit on venting or it won't cook
in 20 minutes and it'll spit a lot at you.

Sprouted Vegan Refried Beans

5 cups pinto beans - soak and sprout 2 days in advance or do quick soak or overnight soak method as stated on the package
Put beans into the cooking pot then add:
1/4c minced dried onions
2 T garlic salt
2 T cumin
Water up to right UNDER the beans for sprouted beans...and just over for soaked beans.

Cook in your InstantPot on pressure cook for 20 minutes, then let the pressure slowly dissipate on it's own. Set your valve to pressure. Should take around 45 minutes in all. Carefully check your valve and carefully move it to venting with a wooden spoon. Close again if pressure starts bursting out and wait. Once it does not vent anymore you can remove the lid. If using a normal pot, cook as normal on the stove.

2-3 cups salsa-medium

1/2c. corn oil

Heat up oil in 8 qt dutch oven or other heavy bottom pot.

Carefully pour in beans into the hot oil. Let them fry for a bit then mash them up with an immersion blender or potato masher.

You can eat immediately with chips or tortillas. The next day they have set up firmly in the fridge and also the flavors have blended nicely. Use for burritos, tacos, quesadillas or freeze in 1 qt yogurt containers. If you freeze: thaw and fry your pre-frozen beans in a small frying pan (like with eggs, in oil or not) to get rid of the excess water that seems to come with freezing beans.

Enjoy!

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Here is the 8 quart InstantPot but people love the 6 quart also.


This is not the same immersion blender that
I have but it gets great reviews for the price!




I use my 1/2 gallon jars regularly.
To store grains, sprout grains, store goat milk, homemade juice...




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