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Just realized a bag of dried beans goes way further than canned
I was talking to my neighbor Carol last week outside our apartments in Phoenix, and she told me she feeds her family of 4 for under 3 bucks a meal using dried beans instead of canned. She showed me how she soaks a whole pound overnight and slow cooks them with some onion and garlic. Now I'm wondering if anyone else has a favorite cheap bean recipe that isn't just chili or soup?
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nina83420d ago
Goes way further" - that's an understatement. My friend Jake in Tucson started doing this after he lost his job last year. He told me he bought a 5lb bag of pinto beans for like 4 bucks and it lasted him almost two months. He just throws them in a crockpot with a ham hock and some chili powder, eats it with tortillas. Said he saved enough to buy a used bike.
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danieljenkins20d ago
I gotta push back on this a little, @nina834. Five pounds of pinto beans might stretch your food budget, but that diet is a one-way ticket to feeling like garbage. I tried that exact same thing for a month when I was trying to save up for a new transmission. By week three, I was so bloated and gassy I couldn't sleep, and I had zero energy to even ride that hypothetical bike. Your friend Jake might have saved forty bucks, but he probably lost it on toilet paper and ibuprofen for the stomach cramps. Plus, buying a used bike sounds great until you factor in that you're running on bean farts and no protein variety, so you're too weak to pedal up any hill. The trade-off isn't worth it unless you're literally choosing between beans and starvation.
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