This might go down on the record as longest recipe creation ever. For me anyway. I started this on Saturday afternoon around 1 p.m. and finally sat down to eat on Tuesday evening. I
highly doubt I'll be recreating these again. I see crockpot refried beans in my future. My full intention was to make refried beans out of the sprouted pintos using coconut oil, onion, fresh garlic, cumin, chili powder, paprika, salt & pepper. Unfortunately, I didn't have enough time to really devote to doing it properly and just ended up eating them slightly smashed with spices unmeasured. I think I was just over it by then, honestly. If you think baking your own bread is too demanding, sprouting pintos is definitely not for you.
Why sprout beans? They're said to have better digestive qualities, increase protein, essential fatty acids and vitamins and minerals. It turns something good for you into something better. I admit to being a smidge granola, so this seemed like a fun little science experiment, while also boosting the good stuff in a food I eat so frequently.
Lowdown: The process included soaking overnight for 10-12 hours, then draining and placing in a warm place (oven with the light on) for a few days. They can sprout in 1 day or take up to 3 days. Each day, you rinse and drain them 3 times and put them back. Once they are sprouted, you cook them on the stove covered with about 1 inch of water over the top for about an hour, until they're soft. At this point, you freeze, eat, or smash them yourself and add the additional ingredients. I froze the equivalent of 4 cans of cooked pintos to eat at a later date/turn into refried beans.
The process was just too long. The pintos smell like they are fermenting and I found that totally unappealing. Two days of waiting for beans to be ready is really too long for me. And to make matters worse? I put the lid on my dutch oven during cooking and didn't leave an air vent... went upstairs to read books with B and my entire stove was covered in yucky bean water. I was definitely
over it at this point.
Anyone else ever sprouted beans? What was your experience? Where did I go wrong?
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4 comments:
Smell is such a trigger for memories for me. While reading this I instantly thought of the awful smell of growing lima beans as a kid. I use to do this as a cool science experiment to watch a seed become a plant. I'm not sure why I didn't just have a garden, it would have smelled better. Anyway, I'm with you on the yuck smell of wet, sprouting beans!
I wish you could have seen my face as I was reading this. I am impressed because of all the projects I might ever take on in my life time, this? Not one of them. But now I can speak authoritatively to the PITA of this process as my reason for not doing so, so thank you for sharing.
I've sprouted things before, blue peas and alphalpha sprouts. It definitely is like looking after a pet and haven't done it again since my first attempt either!
My brother gave Gabby an assortment of beans to sprout for Christmas! Should be interesting!
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