We should have a “what should i cook tonight?” community! Deciding what to make is the hardest part!
A change that was truly freeing for our family was to decide on just a few repeating standard meals. We did one night for tacos, one for some kind of fish, and one for some frozen food. Depending on how quickly you get bored, you can make the same or different things within those general outlines, but it helped narrow the decision tree at least for those nights.
After some time, we expanded to an even more thoroughly planned schedule, but that’s not where I would try to start. Just a loose schedule for some go-to meals that aren’t too repetitive but also don’t require too much energy to plan, prep, and make. Then you have more energy for deciding on other nights, or some basis for planning the other nights if that’s what you want.
brazilian beans.
- a cup or two of beans soaked overnight (discard the soaking water). you can make with black beans, but i prefer pinto (whoa)
- 1 or 2 clovers of garlic
- 1 or 2 large onions
- salt
- water or a stock of your choice (works better with meat or vegetable stock)
sautée the diced garlic and onions in cooking oil or lard until golden. add the strained beans, about a teaspoon of salt, cover with water or stock up to 1.5, 2 cm above the beans. cook for about 30 min in a pressure cooker over low fire. after done, mash some beans to free some starch to the broth and adjust the salt to your liking. serve with some white rice, lettuce and tomato salad, and a protein of your choice (steak with onions, roasted chicken, fish fillet, sausages, pork steak, schnitzel, fried egg and veggie patties are popular choices).
if enough broth is left over, it can be served on its own as soup on small cups, often with some drops of the hot sauce of your choice (tabasco, jalapeño, sriracha). this is called “caldinho”, or little broth, and goes well accompanying beer, caipirinha, mojito or daiquiri.
you can also add some other things to boost your beans. popular choices are diced tomatoes or tomato paste, diced bell peppers, winter squash cubes, green onions, cilantro, parsley, powdered cumin, bacon or jerky cubes, diced sausages, or roasted meat/pork leftovers.
deleted by creator
made this dish just yesterday for my meat munchers with roasted pork leftovers, peppers and cumin/smoked paprika/rosemary/msg/espresso/sugar/garlic powder
if you use an instant pot you don’t need to soak the beans just high pressure for an hour gets it done. I pop it into the oven for a couple hours to get the maillard reaction flavoring anyway though. Didn’t do any mashing on this batch as well, by request. a family favorite for sure i do this weekly!
deleted by creator
