Beans for when the chips are down

I don’t think I’m ever going to be sick of beans.

On toast, cold and out of the tin, heeled over purties; to paraphrase a friend of mine, I could eat them to a band playing – and it wouldn’t even have to be a good band at that.

Back in my student days, the uni canteen used to serve up a full Irish for a pound every morning.

What about that for a deal? One of everything – sausage, bacon, potato bread, egg, beans and toast – for a single buckaroo.

However as far as my beer-addled memory tells me, this cheap feed was time specific, and the offer only stood from 7.30am until 9.30am.

It was good thinking on the part of the college powers-that-were though.

Entice the ne’er-do-wells in with the promise of a super cheap fry and they might be inclined to hang around for a while and maybe even attend a few lectures.

It worked too (kinda) and me and the gang could regularly be seen queuing up at ungodly hours, bleary-eyed and probably still half cut, for the promise of a hot meal.

No lectures though. After the grub was swallied it was straight home to think deep thoughts about the transience of youth or alternatively, hide and seek around the house.*

And yet… as much as I am probably the World’s Number One Bean Fan, I never had them with my fry. Even into grown-up-hood, I still don’t.

Why? You might ask.

Because taking beans with a fry makes everything taste of beans.

Instead of enhancing the experience, the beans overpower everything. My old friend’s Gerry’s supposition, “Sure they help the whole show slide down,” didn’t and doesn’t wash.

The key when it comes to beans, I think, is not to let them overpower your food.

Instead, you have to compliment and in some cases, overpower the beans. It’s a battle! But one with delicious consequences. Speaking of battles…

I am reminded of the importance of staples like beans during these times of uncharted realities and potential impecuniousness.

Many of us are already out of work and already feeling the pinch.

The silent and invisible enemy feels as though it’s everywhere, lurking on door handles, adrift on the air and even skulking wicked and repulsive on our foodstuffs.

Therefore, if we’re to tighten our belts in the coming weeks and months, dear friends, you could do a whole lot worse than experiment with a tin of beans. You can thank me later, but I’ve already been involved in the experimentation, on your behalf.

The very term, ‘cheap and cheerful’ could well have been invented for a tin of baked beans.

OK, so they’re not the most exciting things on planet Earth but they’re healthy, nutritious and with careful coaxing can be elevated to celestial levels of gastronomic appreciation.

I have taken the liberty of including three recipes herein, curried beans, Mexican beans and cheaty bean-y shakshuka.

Curried beans goes down a bomb with chips, Mexican beans you can dump onto tortilla chips with added cheese and sour cream, or even wrapped in a tortilla blanket with more of the cheese and the sour cream.

Cheaty bean-y Shakshukla is the new breakfast of your dreams.

INGREDIENTS – CURRIED BEANS

1 tsp of butter

1 tsp of sunflower oil

1 red onion, finely chopped

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 tbsp of curry powder (or a tbsp of your favourite curry paste)

1 tin of baked beans

handful of grated cheddar

THE PLAN

Add the butter and oil to a medium sauce pan, and dump in the onion. Cook over a medium heat until softened. Add the garlic and stir-fry for a minute and then add the curry powder or curry paste. Stir-fry for another minute and then dump in the beans. Bring to a simmer and they’re almost done. Remove from the heat and stir through the grated cheddar. Serve up with home-made chips – alleluia!

INGREDIENTS – MEXICAN BEANS

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 red chilli, finely chopped

1 tbsp of olive oil

1 tsp of ground cumin

1 tsp of smoked paprika

1 tsp of dried oregano

2 tbsps of Worchestershire sauce

1 tin of baked beans

salt and black pepper

THE PLAN

Add the olive oil to a sauce pan with the red chill and fry for one minute. Add the garlic, give it another minute and then add the cumin, paprika and oregano. Stir-fry for another minute or so and then add the beans and the Worchestershire sauce and when it’s all bubbling, check the seasoning and adjust.

Come to think of it, these would also work well in a quesedilla with a good handful of grated cheddar.

INGREDIENTS – CHEATY BEAN-Y SHAKSHUKA

dash of olive oil

1 large white onion, thinly sliced

4 rashers of smoked streaky bacon, chopped up

2 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 tsp of ground cumin

1 tsp of paprika

half tsp of chilli powder

1 tin of chopped tomatoes

good pinch of sugar

1 tin of beans

salt and black pepper

4 eggs

cheddar or feta

THE PLAN

Add the oil to a medium sized frying pan and dump in the onions. Give them a pinch of salt and the fry over a medium heat for five minutes until they’ve lost their rawness and are translucent. Add the garlic and stir-fry for another minute.

Remove from the pan and set aside.

Add the chopped bacon to the pan and fry until beginning to crisp. Return the onions and garlic mixture with the spices and stir everything together for a minute.

Add the tin of tomatoes and the pinch of sugar and let it bubble for two or three minutes or so, until some of the juices have cooked off.

Add the beans and stir through and then, check the seasoning and adjust.

Then, being careful not to break the yolks, crack the eggs into the pan, stick on a lid (in my case a large plate), turn the heat down low and bubble for about six or seven minutes until the eggs are just set but the yolks still a bit runny.

Top with some grated cheddar or crumbled feta and devour at length with crusty bread or, if you’re at yourself, home-made flatbreads.

*One epic hide and seek session lasted a whole evening once (we’d run out of disposable income for the essentials like Lazer cider) and the seeker was blindfolded via the cunning use of an over-sized leprechaun hat which was pulled down over their face. Wile gas, it was.