Dinner on a Dime

I've felt much more lonely since I returned from my visit with Sean in Nottingham.  It has been like I prepared for the first stretch of time Sean would be gone before I went to visit, but not for the 6 weeks after my return.  As a result I have found myself feeling a little less motivated and not done as much creating in the kitchen as I normally do.  I think I have snapped out of it though.  Although this post is a few weeks overdue, and I apologize.  I still have a number of food adventures to share from that trip, but it will have to come retroactively at this point.

After my lovely trip to the UK to visit my love I found myself a little more than strapped for cash and missing some of my British favourites.

Growing up, my mum would sometimes take a break from cooking an all out dinner, which may have had something to do with taking care of three active children.  One of her classics was baked beans on toast.  Sometimes there would be cut up hotdogs in the baked beans.

Delicious.  Seriously.

In Nottingham, one of Sean’s favourite cheap eats was called Potato Jackets.  They were these large baked potatoes with baked beans, corn, butter and cheese.  Heart stopping goodness for only £3!  I never actually had one myself, but only because I was too full from fish and chips and curry…and cider.

This past Monday all we were hearing about was the storms Hurricane Sandy was leaving in her path.  Despite all the warnings, thankfully, nothing much hit the Kingston area.  Tuesday morning was beautiful.  The sun came out and it was warm.  I try to take advantage of the lovely fall days as much as possible, and with rain in the forecast for the afternoon, I decided to spend some time out in the garden.  It was time to plant some garlic.

Sean and I had purchased a large bag of garlic from a local farmer.  Apparently, if you plant garlic cloves from bulbs that have been grown in your area for at least a few years, you are more likely to get a larger more successful crop of garlic.  Garlic gets acclimatized to the soil in your growing area when it has been grown there for a while.  Once you start getting a good crop of your own, ideally you would keep some large bulbs from your crop and use those for next year’s crop.  Our crop this year was a little small, so we’ve decided to try some purchased local garlic.

You are also supposed to plant garlic in the fall a few weeks before the ground freezes.  While it is probably more than a few weeks before the ground freezes, you never know!  Break the bulbs apart into individual cloves.  Choose the larger cloves, as they produce the larger bulbs.  You can cook with the smaller cloves.  Plant with the pointy part of the bulb facing upward, the tip about two inches from the surface of the ground.  Plant cloves about eight inches apart in rows.

While outside I discovered a few sad and lonely tomatoes (on October 30^th!), a mountain of habenero peppers, and an even bigger mountain of tomatillos.  Other than the remaining swiss chard and kale, I think that’s it for the season.

Keeping my saving money hat on, I did what I always like to do.  Improvise.  I had a jar of dried mixed beans that had been sitting around for a while, originally purchased for a bean soup.  Because it was still morning, I threw the beans in a pot of warm water and let it sit until late afternoon.  If you are planning ahead, unlike I did, put your dried beans in water the night before you are going to be cooking with them and they will be ready in morning.  Or, leave at least 8 hours.

Previously when I have made baked beans from a recipe I have used tomatoes, molasses, vinegar and brown sugar.  Well, I didn’t have any molasses.  Shoot.  I opened my fridge.  Tamarind sauce!  This could work.  I threw together a bunch of other ingredients: smoky paprika, white vinegar, ketchup, gluten free Worcestershire sauce, brown sugar and grainy Dijon mustard.  I also had some jars of pureed canned tomatoes from our garden last year.  Inspired, I had all confidence that these ingredients could make me a tasty batch of baked beans.  All that needed to be added to the mix was onions and garlic…thankfully I still had some onions, and I still had the smaller cloves of garlic from planting.  My goal of not having to buy anything to make this meal was met.

Improvised Baked Beans

2 cups dried beans, soaked for 8 hours

3 small onions, sliced

4 cloves garlic, minced

2 cups canned pureed tomatoes

2 cups diced fresh tomatoes (the last from the garden!)

1 tbsp tamarind sauce (substitute molasses if you have it)

1 tbsp vinegar

¼ cup brown sugar

2 tbsp ketchup

1 tbsp gluten free Worcestershire sauce

1 tbsp grainy Dijon mustard (substitute dried mustard if you have it)

After the beans have soaked and as you start prepping the rest of the ingredients, put the pot of beans on the stove and boil the beans for about 20-30 minutes, or until tender.

I sliced the onions, although you could dice them, I just like to have the texture.  I sautéed the onions in a large saucepan on high, this cooked the onions quickly, but also added a little char for some smoky flavor.  I quickly diced up the tomatoes and added them to the saucepan and then the garlic.  The rest of the ingredients I mixed together in a mixing bowl and waited for the beans to be ready.  I added the beans to the saucepan and then the sauce mix.  I also added about 2 cups of water.  Then I let the whole mixture simmer for about two hours, covered.  If the mixture loses too much moisture, add more water and continue to simmer.

While the beans were simmering I had a look at what else I could add to dinner.  Eureka!  Frozen locally made Bratwurst in my freezer.  What a great way to upscale the hotdogs from my past.

Sadly, I had no potatoes.  But I think roasted or boiled potatoes or even mashed potatoes would have been perfect.  Or, go with the classic toast.  I prefer tapioca bread for toast.  Or maybe cornbread muffins.  Yes, that could be delicious.

After simmering for about two hours, I had a rich, delicious pot of baked beans.  The tamarind totally worked.  They were delicious.  And best of all…I didn’t spend a dime (at least not today).