Rice and Beans?

[roanna]

Has anyone literally eaten just rice and beans for most of your meals?  

 

Dave Ramsey says to do it when you are tight on money but I just wanted to ask someone who has really done it.

 

[DawnM]

I thought that was a figure of speech for eating cheaper.

[NorthwestMom]

He is speaking metaphorically.  Eat as cheaply as you can, it doesn't have to literally be rice and beans.

 

BTW, I was hoping for a good rice and beans recipe when I opened this thread.  I love them.  Anybody want to share???

[roanna]

I learned how to make ranchero beans being in the south tip of Texas and they are really good.  I have met a few women down here that say that's all their family had money for was rice and beans.  Also, my husband cannot eat gluten so cheap sandwiches and ramen/mac and cheese is out and he despises tuna from an earlier period of poverty in his life.  

 

I was actually being serious about just beans and rice though. I know he may just being saying eat cheap but beans and rice are literally probably the cheapest yet healthy.  

 

I would try the Ranchero bean recipe, it uses pinto beans, bacon, chopped tomatoes, garlic and green chiles.  

 

I used the recipe off the bag of pinto beans but this is similar:

 

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ingrid-hoffmann/ranchero-beans-recipe/index.html

[Χά�ων]

He is speaking metaphorically.  Eat as cheaply as you can, it doesn't have to literally be rice and beans.

 

BTW, I was hoping for a good rice and beans recipe when I opened this thread.  I love them.  Anybody want to share???

 

DS will eat them all day if I out them in a tortilla.

[MomOfOneFunOne]

AMDG

 

As pretty frugal vegetarians, we eat rice and beans at least once per week and often as many as three times or more.  I often make a pot of beans on Tuesday to use in several different ways over the course of the week.  For example:

Tuesday, beans with cornbread and greens

something else on Wednesday

Thursday, rice and beans (maybe chickpeas on rice topped with isreali salad and labneh, or black beans/rice topped with lettuce/cilantro/tomato/lime dressing and avocado, et c)

Friday, something else

Saturday, Soup with beans as an ingredient.

 

It depends on the week and the beans we made.  Also, sometimes we don't have the soup on Saturday but for lunches . . . whatever.

 

Black beans makes quesadillas, beans and rice like above, black bean soup, a bean salad to top polenta, et c.

Chick peas makes beans and rice like above, chick pea stew (with tomatoes, spinach, dill, sometimes rice, lemon squeezed on at the end), hummus with tomato/cuke/lemon salad on pita, et c

Pinto makes rice and beans with some kind of salad on top, zuppa de pasta e fagioli (Itallian pasta and bean soup), beans/cornbread/greens, 

 

There are tons more combinations . . . anything you can think of.

[fdrinca]

We do, three days out of the week. It absolutely makes a difference with the grocery bill!

[Cosmos]

We ate rice and beans a lot just after college. We were vegetarian and had very little money. It wasn't *just* rice and beans, but we ate some type of legume several times a week along with lots of whole grains and vegetables. We ate things like lentil soup and biscuits, pinto beans and rice, vegetarian chili with homemade bagels, etc. We made all of our own bread. Breakfast was usually homemade muffins. It didn't really feel difficult at the time, but it would probably be hard to go back to it now. I remember thinking of bell peppers as a special treat because of how expensive they were.

[Amira]

We eat lots of whole grains and legumes, although not always rice and beans for every meal. If I can buy them I bulk they're very cheap and I feel like they're nutritious if we have vegetables with them (that's not necessarily a popular opinion on this board). Finding an inexpensive source for vegetables is more difficult, but nearly always doable. We were on a very tight budget when we lived in Seattle and mostly lived off whole grains, legumes, and vegetables.

[alef]

My family ate lots of rice and beans growing up. They certainly featured as our most common dinner. With salsa and cheese.

 

 

 

[MomOfOneFunOne]

We eat lots of whole grains and legumes, although not specially rice and beans every meal. If I can buy them I bulk they're very cheap and I feel like they're nutritious if we have vegetables with them (that's not necessarily a popular opinion on this board). Finding an inexpensive source for vegetables is more difficult, but nearly always doable. We were on a very tight budget when we lived in Seattle and mostly lived off whole grains, legumes, and vegetables.

AMDG

 

THAT!  Beans and rice is the easy part.  Inexpensive veggies requires more creativity.  For fruits, I prefer variety and have it but in a bind, there is always a banana!  

 

If there were actually coupons for fruits/veggies, I'd bother to clip.

[roanna]

I am glad somebody thought I was serious.  Thank you for all the helps.  I'd love to hear more.  

 

I especially would like to know how your family dealt with the family complaining, if they did.  

 

[Dandelion]

Agree that it's a figure of speech.

 

Completely irrelevant anecdote: whenever I hear "rice and beans", I immediately think "franks and beans".  I can't help it.  If you've seen "There's Something about Mary" you'll know what I'm talking about.   :p 
 

[Χά�ων]

I am glad somebody thought I was serious.  Thank you for all the helps.  I'd love to hear more.  

 

I especially would like to know how your family dealt with the family complaining, if they did.  

 

I told mine he was welcome to eat anything he could hunt, skin and clean himself if he didn't like what I was cooking. At the time he had young, had no experience. He took a sword to try and catch a frog for lunch. He was unsuccessful and hasn't complained since. Might not work for all children.

[Carol in Cal.]

When I bought my first house, i was single and strapped to the wall.  I ate frozen bean burritos several nights a week, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch (I was an engineer at a computer firm at the time.  NO ONE brought their lunch from home.  Except me.)  It was totally worth it.

 

I had found a house that the owner was going to carry the mortgage on, and so they loaned me more than any bank would have.  That's why I had to be so so so careful.

[Amira]

I am glad somebody thought I was serious. Thank you for all the helps. I'd love to hear more.

 

I especially would like to know how your family dealt with the family complaining, if they did.

During our tightest years, my dh just dealt with the food because he knew there wasn't much else to do about it, my youngest was a toddler and didn't know any better, and my middle son who was 8-10 at the time is an amazingly versatile eater. My oldest hated it though, but he doesn't like anything healthy. He managed to complain enough to make up for everyone else not complaining, but there really wasn't another choice. We did focus on talking about eating healthy food rather than saying we couldn't afford what he wanted. I still don't buy most of what he would love to eat.

[lmrich]

Growing up we always had eggs for dinner at the end of the month when the money was running low. I loved it and still love breakfast for dinner.

[MomOfOneFunOne]

I am glad somebody thought I was serious.  Thank you for all the helps.  I'd love to hear more.  

 

I especially would like to know how your family dealt with the family complaining, if they did.  

AMDG

 

My people don't want them every night and when we do have them several times per week, they definitely do not want them to be the same way each time.  

 

I try to always cook as deliciously as possible with lots of herb, et c and they like my cooking.  I almost never get complaints but, we are a small family and I find it easy to accommodate our tastes.  My kiddo hates raw onions, steamed zucchini, boiled broccoli (who doesn't) and heavy, hot spices so, either I don't serve them or I serve them separately.  On the spice, for example, I fix a milder version of chili than I like and add spice to mine.  For Israeli salad, I just make it without onion and have a green onion with mine if I want.  That way, everyone is happy.  

 

I really don't get many complaints but if I served just plain rice and beans every single night, I would.  The same beans, dressed differently over the course of several nights in the week but not all, keeps everyone happy.

 

Also, canned beans adds up the cost.  Make your own from dried is more frugal by far and home canning your own, if you already have the equipment, is far less expensive than purchasing canned.

[Elfknitter.#]

Sometimes a batch of rice and beans is my lunch for the work week.

[MomOfOneFunOne]

Growing up we always had eggs for dinner at the end of the month when the money was running low. I loved it and still love breakfast for dinner.

AMDG

 

We have eggs for supper on Mondays/shopping day.  Somehow, after tidying the pantry/fridge, making the menu and list, and shopping/schlepping home the food, I don't want to cook much that day.  So, Mondays is always something eggs and sometimes, just eggs and toast.  We all love eggs in a nest.  Also, we like to bake our delicious tortillas into taco shells and have egg tacos.

[alef]

I don't remember anyone in my family complaining about beans and rice. We liked it. The homemade salsa made a big difference.

[mmpmelmack]

We eat lots of beans and rice, I buynthe rice and beans in bulk from azure standard, and I buy my fruit and veggies from bountiful baskets.org, they are very inexpensive, and great quality. I can keep our grocery bill to about 65 a week for the 3 and a half of us! My kids eat what I put out or they don't eat. We do lots of different bean dishes, I have a cookbook called 365 bean and grain dishes or something like that. You really have to change your mindset, we eat to live not live to eat. I have to put the baby to bed, but I will link some favorites later!

[laundrycrisis]

I used to live in an area of Cajun influence - it was not uncommon there at all for people to eat rice for breakfast, beans and rice for lunch as the main course, and then again at dinner, along with some sausage/fish/shellfish and a vegetable.   When I lived there, I ate beans and rice 3-4 times a week.  It was available everywhere, including little mom and pop groceries and even some gas stations that had little snack services.  Seriously, beans and rice were everywhere and people there eat it all the time.  It's the staple food.

 

And I must say there was some magic in how they made it there - it was really good !

[mommymonster]

BTW, I was hoping for a good rice and beans recipe when I opened this thread.  I love them.  Anybody want to share???

 

I am a big bean and rice fan... healthy and remarkably cheap! We have four bean and rice dishes that are in frequent rotation at our house: 

 

Red beans and rice (like this one)

Lentils and rice (like this one)

Chickpea stew over rice (like this one)

Black beans and rice (for the black beans, soak dried beans overnight in water. About 2 hours before you want to serve, boil black beans with four cloves crushed garlic and a few bay leaves until tender. Saute one onion is a tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat for 10 minutes while the beans are cooking. Drain the black beans, add onions, a bit of salt, and pepper to taste. Serve black beans over rice. Garnish with salsa and sour cream.)

[roanna]

I now live just a few miles from Mexico and at all the church events they have awesome bean dishes and its just changed my mind about beans. we are really tight on money so I really am wanting to use beans more. Its nearly only pinto beans eaten here and they have huge huge bins of them at the grocery store.

 

I wasnt raised in a poor home so I have no experience with a real menu of beans but I am gaining the gumption to try it. Like I said the beans down here taste great so it inspired me.

[roanna]

I used to live in an area of Cajun influence - it was not uncommon there at all for people to eat rice for breakfast, beans and rice for lunch as the main course, and then again at dinner, along with some sausage/fish/shellfish and a vegetable. When I lived there, I ate beans and rice 3-4 times a week. It was available everywhere, including little mom and pop groceries and even some gas stations that had little snack services. Seriously, beans and rice were everywhere and people there eat it all the time. It's the staple food.

 

And I must say there was some magic in how they made it there - it was really good !

this is pretty much how I want to change my mindset. Down here most stuff is flavored with bacon. Being originally from Seattle I had to adjust to this.

 

...edit...I just remembered when I lived in South Korea for a month we ate rice and kim chi for breakfast, rice for lunch, rice and meat for dinner. No beans though.

[dbmamaz]

when I was a vegetarian student I ate a lot of rice and beans.  One of our staples was brown rice and lentils cooked together, with ANYTHING on top of it - stir-fried veggies is fine, because the rice and lentils is a complete protein.  Or cheese and salsa.  I'd make big pots of vegetarian chili to serve over rice, or split pea soup with barley (out if you are gluten free, but you could try quinoa instead).  I still love a good white bean and sausage and greens soup . . . and even with some meat, chili with beans goes a lot further.

[LucyStoner]

We eat many variations on rice and beans with veggies. I am a pretty big fan of lentils and split peas though so that is more common than beans. I honestly wouldn't take that advice as a metaphor. If you are eating on the cheap or are eating less meat for health reasons, legumes and brown rice are healthier and more filling than many of the similar cost alternatives like white pasta, ramen noodles, boxed Mac and cheese etc.

[Truscifi]

We eat legumes of some sort at least once a week to stretch the budget. We also eat eggs for dinner once a week. Dh is usually just happy I cooked, and ds10...well, he's getting there. I finally got to a point where I would send him to his room if he was complaining about dinner. He had the option to come back out and eat after we were done, we just got tired of his attitude spoiling our dinner.

 

Also, I spent some time in Costa Rica when I was younger. We ate rice and beans literally every meal there. Rice and black beans cooked separately and served with eggs and fruit for breakfast, rice and black beans cooked together and served with tortillas and maybe some fruit for lunch, and rice and black beans cooked together and served with veggies and perhaps a meat for dinner. I got used to it. They had different sauces/salsas too that helped add variety.

[Amira]

I now live just a few miles from Mexico and at all the church events they have awesome bean dishes and its just changed my mind about beans. we are really tight on money so I really am wanting to use beans more. Its nearly only pinto beans eaten here and they have huge huge bins of them at the grocery store.

 

I wasnt raised in a poor home so I have no experience with a real menu of beans but I am gaining the gumption to try it. Like I said the beans down here taste great so it inspired me.

If you like the beans where you are, it might be a good idea to check out a Mexican cookbook to get some ideas of how to cook them. The beans on the border are good, but there are some amazing beans in other parts of Mexico too.

[happi duck]

I am so surprised at the notion that rice and beans is a figure of speech.

[Colleen in NS]

I am glad somebody thought I was serious.  Thank you for all the helps.  I'd love to hear more.  

 

I especially would like to know how your family dealt with the family complaining, if they did.  

 

I think of it as beans and whole grains, and I agree that beans-n-rice is a metaphor for whatever is inexpensive in your area.  Here, rice costs a lot more than wheat or oats or rye (or potatoes).  And yes, we eat this a lot.  Helps us to live within our means.  I have huge sacks of legumes and grains in the freezer.  Legumes are very versatile.

 

Complaining....I've tried various things over the years, but ultimately I now just ignore complaints, lol!  My kids are welcome to dress up beans if I haven't done so, because I don't want to spend tons of time trying to make beans in different ways all the time.

[gaillardia]

I posted a recipe for complimentary pie and i think I got it from Diet for a Small Planet. We use brown rice, black beans usually, cheese and eggs and lots of tarragon. Kids love it

[SKL]

I enjoy rice and beans, as does one of my two kids.  My other girl despises beans, so we don't have them every day.  ;)

[MomatHWTK]

If you look at various grain-diet based cultures, you'll often see some grain combined with beans because the amino acides of two together form a complete protein. 

[joannqn]

I make about 3 pounds of pinto beans most weeks and use them in a few meals. I cook pinto beans with an onion , 3 strips of uncured bacon, and salt.  

Day 1: We put the whole, cooked beans over rice and top it with a little bit of seasoned chicken (two chicken breasts for 6 of us), homemade guacamole, and salsa.  We like to serve this with tortilla chips.  Dh and I will often put this over salad greens.  This meal gets cheers and many thank yous every time I make it.

Day 2:  I reheat the beans and mash them with a potato masher.  Then I brown and season some ground beef, and we make burritos.  

 

Any remaining beans get used in burritos for lunch or dinner, added to breakfast burritos, or added to scrambled eggs.

We also like navy beans and ham.  A new tradition we started last year is the buy a large ham for Christmas dinner so we can have leftover ham in the freezer for navy beans and ham.  I can get enough leftover ham to make several large pots of soup.  We also like black-eyed pea soup.  They are my kids' favorite soups.  




 

[Elfknitter.#]

We eat legumes of some sort at least once a week to stretch the budget. We also eat eggs for dinner once a week. Dh is usually just happy I cooked, and ds10...well, he's getting there. I finally got to a point where I would send him to his room if he was complaining about dinner. He had the option to come back out and eat after we were done, we just got tired of his attitude spoiling our dinner.

 

Also, I spent some time in Costa Rica when I was younger. We ate rice and beans literally every meal there. Rice and black beans cooked separately and served with eggs and fruit for breakfast, rice and black beans cooked together and served with tortillas and maybe some fruit for lunch, and rice and black beans cooked together and served with veggies and perhaps a meat for dinner. I got used to it. They had different sauces/salsas too that helped add variety.

Your post reminded me of how I also enjoy beans and eggs for breakfast some days- usually with some avocado.

[Audrey]

We eat beans regularly.  I make a bean a week.  Big pot of dried beans cooked up with a bit of onion or garlic and some herbs depending upon the bean and what they're going to do later in the week. 

 

First day of beans = beans over/alongside rice.  This might get some bits of meat, like bacon or sausage, with it, or perhaps cheese. I will always serve a green salad to start and some fruit for dessert with this.

 

Next day of beans = the beans used as a filling of some kind, so tacos, burritos, naan roll-ups, samosa-style pockets, etc.  I will also serve some kind of salad with this.  If it is pinto beans, I will frequently make refried beans of them, top them with cheese and serve with homemade corn tortillas and salad.

 

Final day of beans = the last beans go in a soup. 

 

Some weeks I might just make a big pot of bean soup and that will be lunches all week.  Or some weeks, I might do all of the above and still make another pot of a different kind of bean soup.  I do that more in the winter when soups are just the better lunch choice.

 

FWIW, I rarely work from a recipe when it comes to beans.  Beans are wonderful little adaptors to whatever seasoning you want to use, or they just taste good with plain old salt, too (IMO).   I think, as a general rule, most pink/red beans and black beans are better for stronger seasonings like chili, cumin, and hot peppers.  I think white beans are better for delicate herbs, and I think lentils and chickpeas are perfect for curry.  Those little Puy lentils make the best soup, though.

[Elfknitter.#]

I like using leftover pork roasts with mine. So if there isn't enough meat for another meal, rather than clean the cast iron Dutch oven out I'll add soaked beans and spices. Then there's the bonus of a bit of meat plus extra flavor from any meat juices and/or fats. Bones are great too- not surprisingly I like ham bones. :lol:

[Melissa in Australia]

rice seriously disagrees with me. I get massive bloating, cramps and wind.

 

Potatoes and beans are a very nutritious alternative

[skimomma]

We eat a "rice and beans" meal probably 4-5 dinners a week.  And we eat the leftovers for lunches so that is probably more like 8-10 times a week.  My idea of "rice and beans" is inexpensive whole grain and/or legume dish.  That is the staple of our diet whether strapped for cash or not.  There are so many different ways to prepare them that it would never occur to my family to notice that our diet is heavily "rice and beans."  As others have mentioned here, it is very common for me to make a huge pot of rice and a huge pot of some sort of bean and put the pair into several different combos over the course of a week.  I don't do it just to save money….as vegetarians it is just simply the base of most healthy, whole food meals.

[Brilliant]

Does anybody else use a pressure cooker for their beans? It makes it so much easier - you can have beans with dinner even if you forgot to soak. (Although they turn out better & cook faster if you do remember to soak them most of the day).

 

And has anybody else noticed that the price of dried beans has almost doubled in the last few years? The little one-pound bags are now $1.69 in my area! Even bulk prices are $1. I can't order from Azure right now (lost my convenient pickup point) so the best price on anything is the 10# bag of pintos at Costco for $8. I need blackeyed peas for New Years Day and had to pay the $1.69; ouch.

[MomOfOneFunOne]

Does anybody else use a pressure cooker for their beans? It makes it so much easier - you can have beans with dinner even if you forgot to soak. (Although they turn out better & cook faster if you do remember to soak them most of the day).

 

And has anybody else noticed that the price of dried beans has almost doubled in the last few years? The little one-pound bags are now $1.69 in my area! Even bulk prices are $1. I can't order from Azure right now (lost my convenient pickup point) so the best price on anything is the 10# bag of pintos at Costco for $8. I need blackeyed peas for New Years Day and had to pay the $1.69; ouch.

AMDG

Yes! I have noticed. I cringe and hate it but am still thankful that I'm not paying meat prices.

 

I've never purchased in huge quantity before but with as much as we eat, I really should. Storage is a concern, too.

Also, I'd need several huge quantities b/c I'd want some variety.

 

Natural Grocers has geat big bags but I've never checked the price.

 

Hmmmm . . . I'll be checking into that Azure site, too. I've never heard of it b/f. Thx!

[msjones]

Has anyone literally eaten just rice and beans for most of your meals?  

 

Dave Ramsey says to do it when you are tight on money but I just wanted to ask someone who has really done it.

I worked on an orphanage in Mexico for a year.

 

We ate rice and beans and that was about it.

 

Breakfast was rice cereal.  It was cooked with powdered milk, cinnamon, salt, and a bit of sugar. It was actually very good.  Not great nutrition, but filling and tasty.

 

Lunch was beans and rice.  The beans were partly mashed up, cooked in lard, salted, and seasoned as seasoning was available.  Onions were added fairly often.  The rice had spices and tomato added as available.  

 

Dinner was leftover beans and rice.  

 

The servings of beans and rice were huge -- a heaping serving on a full-sized dinner plate. 

 

The beans and rice came in huge 50 pound bags.  The powdered milk came in huge cans.  

 

We had canned fruit on Sundays.  Sometimes there was a powdered fruit drink served.  

 

Those were some cheap meals.  But no one was hungry.

[roanna]

((((Breakfast was rice cereal.  It was cooked with powdered milk, cinnamon, salt, and a bit of sugar. It was actually very good.  Not great nutrition, but filling and tasty.))))

 

MSJONES,

 

We called that rice pudding growing up.  We still love that, but my husband and kids do not like it.  My mom grew up very poor and they ate that and also toast with cinnamon sugar on it broken up in a little milk.  That is a little more weird because it gets soggy.  

[MomOfOneFunOne]

((((Breakfast was rice cereal. It was cooked with powdered milk, cinnamon, salt, and a bit of sugar. It was actually very good. Not great nutrition, but filling and tasty.))))

 

MSJONES,

 

We called that rice pudding growing up. We still love that, but my husband and kids do not like it. My mom grew up very poor and they ate that and also toast with cinnamon sugar on it broken up in a little milk. That is a little more weird because it gets soggy.

AMDG

 

I definitely did not grow up poor and we had that a lot for special breakfasts. It was and is one of my favorites.

 

But I never even heard of powdered milk till I was an adult. We didnt use that.

[celticmom]

Another vote for red beans and rice. Although I love Mexican dishes as well. I also have a recipe for fake hamburger crumbles made from lentils and brown rice.

[roanna]

I just went to the grocery store and bought a few pounds of beans, garlic, nitrite free bacon and tomatoes to start making regular amounts of the beans they make here.  The pinto beans in the big bins were .88 cents a pound.  I did also get a bag of potatoes on sale for $1.47.  I'll update you all this week to see what reactions I get from my family and our budget. 

 

So I went back and got masa to make my own corn tortillas.  I figured that we regularly buy 30 corn tortillas for $1.50 but I can make 150 from one bag of masa at $2.88.  I'd say that is much better!  and they are supposed to taste way better.  I am going to use this recipe:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/corn-tortillas/

 

 

 

 

[roanna]

Another vote for red beans and rice. Although I love Mexican dishes as well. I also have a recipe for fake hamburger crumbles made from lentils and brown rice.

 

Could you share this recipe.  I used to be vegetarian but can no longer eat soy.  

[LucyStoner]

Homemade tortillas definitely liven up beans! Homemade tortillas always make me feel rich no matter how cheap they are to make. Life is good when you have homemade tortillas on your dinner plate.