Mary's Bean Stew - Take 4 and Take 5

Yes, today is the fourth time I'm making Mary McDougall's Bean Stew in my oval Crockpot, and I can say without a doubt it will be the LAST time I attempt to make this in this appliance.

I wrote all about the first time I made it, how it kept drying out, how I kept adding water, when I added twice the amount of water to beans to start, because it had steamed and dripped all over my counter when I started it in the Instant Pot.

I did not write about the second and third times making it. Each time I used another variety of Rancho Gordo beans. For today's batch, I'm using Rancho Gordo Aluba Blanca small white beans. I usually save this type of bean for when I make baked beans, but what the heck, I figured I'll use these in the stew.

Mary McDougall has said many times she never soaks her beans, that she just tosses beans and water in her slow cooker, and each time I make this recipe that's what I've been doing. Rancho Gordo people have even said their beans are so fresh they really don't need soaking. But darn it, every time I make this recipe, whether I use 4 cups of water to start or the almost 9 cups I used today, I have ALWAYS needed to add more water. Maybe next week I'll try a quick soak first. I don't want to soak these overnight - they're so fresh they'd probably start sprouting.

And definitely next time I'm doing things differently. Instead of making this recipe in the Crockpot, I'm going to cook my beans in the Instant Pot, after soaking first, and follow Jill McKeever's rule of adding enough water to cover at least the first knuckle of your index finger. When done, I'll do a 10 minute natural release, and add the seasoning and sun dried tomatoes, and hit the Keep Warm button for the rest of the cooking time.

Some changes I did make today - I started it off on High, and after an hour had to add more water. After it started to boil again, I lowered it to Low heat for the next 3 hours. At the 4 hour mark I had to add water again, and again let it come to a boil. As soon as it did I again turned it down, and at this time I added the seasoning and sun dried tomatoes. I also added half a pound of frozen mixed greens that I bought in Whole Foods. After an hour on this temp I then turned it down to Keep Warm. Right now, the beans are fully cooked and soft, the tomatoes are rehydrated, the greens are hot - in other words, everything is ready to eat, but it's still a few hours until dinner time. When the time comes, I have some steam-in-bag Yukon Gold potatoes I'll make, then serve it all up.

At least today it's not a dried out, gloppy mess, but a nice stew with lots of flavorful bean broth. Hopefully next week I can just cook it up without having to add another drop and have a meal just as good.

Why am I so determined to get this recipe to work? Well, I did mention I rejoined the Rancho Gordo Bean Club. The other day, the club box plus the other beans I ordered arrived. Yes, I was greeted by yet another bag of runner/lima beans.

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IDN why I never posted the above message when I wrote it out last week. Here's this week's making of Mary's Bean Stew.

Changes:
I used Rancho Gordo's Yellow Indian Woman bean. 

In an attempt to make sure they don't get dried out, I did a soak. Steve Sando, the owner of Rancho Gordo, says his beans are so fresh that if people insist on giving them a pre-soak, do it no more than 6 hours, otherwise they'll sprout. This morning I picked through, cleaned and started to soak the beans before I headed out to a doctor's appointment. By the time I got back from there and a quick grocery store trip, they were not only well soaked but starting to split. All this in only 2 hours! Next week, no soaking.

The next change was where these beans were going to be cooked. Instead of the CrockPot, I tossed them into my Instant Pot with 8 cups of water. According to this chart, soaked Yellow Indian Woman beans take 8 to 10 minutes. I hit Manual, lowered it down to 8 minutes, and let it go. After it hit the Keep Warm stage I let it sit for a while, and after a half hour finally released the last of the steam. It still took 4 minutes before it finished.

The beans looked - and tasted - beautiful! Like miniature pinto beans, so small and pinkish.

At this point I added 2 tablespoons of Mrs. Dash Table Blend and the bag of smoky sun-dried tomatoes and closed the lid, keeping the pot on Keep Warm mode.

A half hour before dinner I popped in an 8 ounce bag of baby spinach and mixed it up. Here's how it looked about 15 minutes later:

By Jove, I think I've got it!

In about 5 minutes I'll be spooning this out over rice for me, cornbread for my husband. I know we're only supposed to have an average of a cup of beans a day on the McDougall program, so I purposely had no beans yesterday and have none planned for tomorrow. I can tell you right now there will not be any leftovers of this stew today.

Maybe I'll get brave next week and try one of those many bags of lima beans I have from the Bean Club over the years. Wish me luck!