who's on first

Me again. Taneasha has a home, and some furniture, but no intrawebs. So, I'm back in my usual Tuesday spot, but I'm taking a break from cookies.

I am a total slave to cravings. I'll spend days trying to ignore the fact that I not only want, but apparently need, a certain type of food. They don't go away. Sometimes it's something nice and healthy like bananas. And when I finanlly find a bunch that is just the right ripeness, I'll eat the whole freaking bunch. Sometimes, it's fried chicken. Way too often it's fried chicken.

Lately though, it's been beans. And not just any beans. It has to be refried beans.

I freaking love refried beans.

Damn good thing too, because they're super cheap, unbelievably easy to make, and they're totally freezable, which means they're perfect for making into burritos to freeze and heat up in the (world's most disgustingly dirty) microwave at school. But we won't talk about that for now. I passed my exams. I've got 3.5 months of calculus-free bliss.

AKA: work.

Now I get to heat up my frozen burrito in a clean nuker.

But first, I had to make beans. Yes, I know, they come in a can. The ones in the can, more often than not, have sugar in them. Sugar. Why the hell do refried beans need sugar added to them? There are times when I'm glad I'm a compulsive label-reader. <<insert rant here about what's wrong with the food industry, and the apathy of consumers>>

Refried beans don't have sugar in them. At least these ones don't. So, as an alternative to the can in your cupboard I offer:

Refritos

What you need:

• 1 c dry pinto beans
• 1 small onion
• 3 cloves garlic
• pinch of cumin
• ~4 c water or broth or stock
• bacon fat
• salt

Yes, I realize I'm ranting about added sugar in a post that advocates the use of bacon fat. This is not a question of "is it healthier." The sugar is likely in there to make the beans taste better, just like the bacon fat is. But, the bacon fat is drippings from the bacon I bought at a local butcher; they make their own bacon from local pigs. I can trace the bacon fat to the farm. It's less than 100 miles away. I can't say the same about that sugar. I know that food tastes better when it has fat and sugar in it. But I'm actively making a choice as a consumer. That's the difference.

What you gotta do:

Dump it all in the crock pot.

Well, kinda. Works best if you rinse the beans first, and chop the onion and garlic.

I'd been planning on using water, but remembered that I had some chicken broth in the freezer.

So I thawed it and dumped it in.

And waited.

And waited.

I am not a patient person.

Particularly not when I have a craving.

Once the beans are soft, and you can mash one against the side of the crock pot (took mine about 4 hours on high), transfer the beans only to a bowl. I don't suggest draining the beans because some of that liquid is handy to have around when you're mashing. So, I fish mine out with the masher.

Mashing is a bit of a taste thing. Or, texture thing, I guess. Some people prefer the beans whole, some like them smashed to smithereens.

I a cake-and-eat-it-too kinda person, so I mash all but about a cup of beans and then just stir them in.

And then, I add the bacon fat. Feel free to leave this out if you'd like, but I don't recommend it.

Now, before you add the last ingredient, you need to taste them. Beans need salt. I like to add the bacon fat first because it is quite salty, and then add tiny amounts, stirring and tasting until they're just right.

Roll them up in a burrito with some guac (cover it with foil and it won't turn brown at all!)

or just dip your chips right in

What weird ingredient have you found by reading labels? Or, do you read labels?

strawberry short cookies

So, while Taneasha may feel like making muffins too soon after I've posted a muffin recipe warrants calling her muffins "cupcakes," I have no qualms whatsoever about posting another berry recipe right after hers.

I wasn't exactly planning on doing this, but there were no macamadamia nuts in the grocery story so I couldn't make the requested white chocolate macamadamia nut cookies that had been requested. What I did find was strawberries.

Cookies aren't what most people think about when looking for strawberry recipies. But, I've been working on a bit of a theme lately. I've turned raspberry tarts, carrot cake, and rocky road ice cream into cookies. Strawberry shortcake anyone?

Strawberry Short Cookies

What you need:

• 2 c diced strawberries
• 1 tbsp of lemon or orange juice
• 1 tbsp sugar

• 1/3 c cold butter
• 2 c flour
• 1/2 c sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 salt (or none if your butter is salted)
• 2/3 c cream or slightly thinned yogurt

What you gotta do:

Rinse and dice your strawberries into small pieces. It took me 13 fair sized berries to get 2 cups diced. Sprinkle the juice and sugar over the berry pieces and give them a stir. Let these sit while you do the rest.

In a big bowl, combine the sugar, flour, baking powder, (salt) and sift them together well.

Chop the butter into chunks and dump them into the bowl.

With a pastry cutter, a pair of forks, or your hand, cut/crush the butter into the flour until it looks like crumbs. If you get bored or tired of doing it before you get there, don't worry. It won't totally ruin things if you have a few bigger butter bits.

I really think the cream is a better option, but I forgot to stop on the way home to get some. I had yogurt. It's a higher fat yogurt so it still tastes good, but it's much thicker than the cream.

Okay, so here, I kinda forgot all about the taking of the pictures... mix the cream/yogurt into the flour-butter crumbs. If you're using yogurt, you may need to add a tablespoon or two of water to get those last dry bits mixed in.

Dump in the strawberry pieces and stir them in gently. Hands work. Oh look! A picture.

Drop spoonfuls onto a parchment lined cookie sheet.

Crap. Preheat the oven to 350. Go get the laundry while it heats.

Add more sugar!

If you have fancy turbinado sugar, the big crystal sugar that shows up on pastries sometimes, use it now. If you just have plain old sugar, use that. Sprinkle the cookies before you bake them. I used about half a teaspoon per dozen.

Bake the cookies for 20-22 minutes.

Yes, really that long. If you can get two sheets in the oven at once, do it. These are more of a mini scone or biscuit than cookie really, and they taste like scones with jam. But they're small like a cookie. And small things are cute. Because they're small. Because they're cute.

Name something cute that isn't small.