A Midsummer Night's Beans

A main-dish salad of navy beans dressed with a tomato and roasted red pepper mix that goes together in the food processor.

Prep Time25

Cook Time8

Course: Main Course, Salad

Keyword: gluten-free, summer, vegan, vegetarian

Servings: cups

Calories: 205kcal

Equipment

pressure cooker

Ingredients

To cook the beans

450 g navy beans dry
710 g water
12 g salt

To dress the beans

28 g garlic
175 g red onion
340 g tomatoes grape or cherry
340 g roasted red peppers Mancini brand preferred
18 g salt
3 g dill dried
33 g white wine vinegar
33 g olive oil
to taste pepper freshly ground

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

To soak the beans:

Sort through the navy beans for broken, shriveled, or discolored beans. Rinse in a sieve under running water, and turn into a large bowl. Cover with cold water, plus one inch. Allow to soak for eight hours. Drain and rinse.
Alternately, place the sorted and cleaned navy beans in the pressure cooker, uncovered, and add water to cover the beans, plus one inch. Bring to a boil, turn off the heat, and allow to soak for one hour. Drain and rinse.

To cook the beans:

Place the soaked navy beans, the measured water, and the salt for the beans in the pressure cooker. Stir to combine.
Place the lid on the pressure cooker and secure it. Turn the stove heat to high and bring to pressure. When the cooker comes to pressure, turn the heat down to medium.
Cook the beans under pressure for nine minutes (or the best duration for navy beans for your cooker), then perform a quick release.
When the pressure has fallen, remove the lid.
Drain the beans in a colander and turn them into a very large bowl. Retain the colander to use again. (The cooking liquid can be retained as aquafaba, or to boost nutrition elsewhere, if you like.)
The beans can be placed in a storage container, refrigerated, and dressed at a later time if desired.

To dress the beans:

While the beans are cooking, set up the food processor. Carefully install the knife blade.
Peel the garlic and cut off the root ends.
Add the garlic to the food processor. Turn on and allow the garlic to become finely chopped. Turn the food processor off.
Cut the root ends off the onion; peel and chunk it. Add the chunked onion to the food processor. Pulse the food processor until the onion is roughly chopped.
Rinse the tomatoes in the colander, drain them thoroughly, and add them to the food processor.
Open the jar of roasted red peppers and turn them into the colander. Rinse them thoroughly under running water - this will reduce their pickled flavor. Shake dry in the colander and add to the food processor.
Add the salt and dried dill to the food processor. Pulse the food processor until the mixture is reduced to small bits, but not puréed. Scrape down with a spatula if necessary while processing.
Pour the contents of the food processor over the drained beans, scraping out the food processor with the spatula. Add the white wine vinegar, olive oil, and freshly ground pepper. Toss gently with the spatula to thoroughly combine. Taste for seasoning.
Serve the dressed beans warm, room temperature, or chilled.

Notes

About the roasted red peppers: Some brands taste a lot more "jarred" than others - that pickle-y citric acid + calcium chloride flavor. Of the ones I've tried, I think Mancini retain the least of that after rinsing and draining.

Nutrition