I got told by my wife, when I came home one day not long ago, that her office was having a party and they were gonna eat Mexican food, and she had volunteered me to cook a pot of beans, and would I please do enough beans for fourteen? At the end of this sentence, which tacitly encompassed a notice that I was on my own for lunch today and might want to call one of my old girlfriends and invite her to lunch, I started in working on providing a pot of beans suitable in quantity for fourteen people at an office luncheon.
I could have used another day’s notice, ideally, because I prefer to soak the beans in cold water rather than parboiling them, but that was sorta out. Anyway, parboiling doesn’t give you a bad pot of beans; I just like them better when they’ve been soaked cold. I also could have used to be told earlier in the day than past 5:00, because parboiling requires four hours or so for the beans to sit around and cool off before you start in seriously to cook them. I didn’t get that either. In view of those facts, I re-evaluated my game plan. Fortunately, beans are one of those things that cook with minimal attention and maintenance. This meant I was able to parboil them right then and put them on to cook late in the evening with enough water to carry them through the night without boiling dry, so I did and this morning I got up to a pot of cooked beans.
Well, the beans turned out fine, but I called the quantity wrong and we wound up with a batch of leftovers. That’s fine too; beans get better as you keep reheating them. Matter of fact, when you do a pot of beans, don’t eat too many the first day. If you can, don’t eat any at all the first day. Let them sit around and age some.
Having all these leftovers, I thought we needed some cornbread to go with it. Cornbread, is my opinion, is best when it is cooked in a well-seasoned cast iron skillet, and turned out on a big plate to be cut up hot in pie slices and buttered well, and eaten with lots of beans. Also, cornbread and beans does manage to make a complete protein, and as such makes a fine meatless meal, not to mention being cheap. Two pounds of beans will run you about seventy-five cents, and a big pan of cornbread costs about the same. This will make a quantity of cornbread and beans to feed Coxey’s Army.
| 2 pounds dried pinto beans | 2 or 3 chiles jalapeños, finely chopped (ditto; I often leave them out altogether) |
| ½ pound salt pork, slashed into a fan shape or chopped large, according to preference | 1 tablespoon Tabasco sauce |
| 1 hambone with some meat still on it, or ½ pound bacon (not near as good) | 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce |
| 2 medium yellow onions, coarsely chopped | 1½ ounce chili powder (Gebhardt’s does best) |
| 1 to 3 fresh chiles poblanos, seeded and chopped fine (adjust to your ideas of how hot it ought to be) | Salt to taste |
Pick over the beans for rocks, wash and soak overnight. (If you don’t have time, then put the beans on with enough water to cover, bring to a rolling boil for three minutes, then pull the pot off the heat, cover it, and go away for four hours.) Next morning, pour off the soaking water if you are at all subject to the farts. Getting rid of that water helps like you wouldn’t believe. Refill your pot with fresh water to cover the beans about two inches, and add the rest of the ingredients. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer, partially covered, at least four hours and preferably as long as you can stand to smell those wonderful beans cooking.
| 1½ cups sifted flour | 2½ cups yellow cornmeal |
| 5 tablespoons baking powder | 2 eggs |
| 2 to 4 tablespoons sugar | 5 tablespoons bacon grease |
| ½ tablespoons salt | 2 cups milk |
Have all ingredients (especially the liquids) at room temperature before starting. Preheat the oven to 425° F. Grease a #8 skillet with some bacon grease and place it in the oven to heat. Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Add the corn meal, and mix well. Beat the eggs, milk, and bacon grease together, and pour into the dry ingredients, combining with a few rapid strokes of a fork. Make sure all the mixture is moistened, but do not beat the batter. Pour into the hot skillet, and bake about 25 minutes.
Now once you’ve got through doing the cornbread, it’s time to take care of your skillet to keep it from losing its seasoning. More good skillets get ruined through people not taking proper care of them, and there is just no excuse for it. I know of nothing better than a well-seasoned cast iron skillet for not having things stick to it, and spreading your heat around where it’s needed. Therefore, I am going to explain just how to season (and keep seasoned) a cast iron skillet.
When you first get a new skillet, take and wash it well with soap and water. Scrub it with a plastic cleaning pad if necessary, to get out the light coating of engine oil the manufacturer puts on to keep it from rusting in the store. Enjoy the experience, because with luck that’s the last time you will ever use soap or any kind of scrubber on that skillet again. Heat your oven to about 350° F. Take a paper towel and some bacon grease or corn oil or Crisco or whatever, and put a light coating of oil or grease all over the inside of the skillet, sides and all. Put this in your hot oven and let it bake for a good long time. If it looks like the oil is burning off, apply another coating. The idea in all this is to bake on an oily finish so hard that the skillet pretty much greases itself for the rest of its (and your) natural-born life. It’s best to bake the skillet two or three times in a row, letting the skillet cool completely each time. When done successfully, this produces a hard finish with a satiny sheen once the pan is dry and clean. You have now seasoned the skillet enough to start using it, although a fully developed seasoning will take a couple of years of steady use. This is why a good skillet is so valuable once it’s running right.
To keep your skillet running right, never get anywhere near it with soap. It just ain’t necessary. The way to clean your pan is this: Once you have finished cooking whatever it is, turn on the hot water tap and let the water run as hot as it will. Get a lot of paper towels and have them ready, within reach. Take the skillet and run hot water in it, then dump the water and start wiping with a paper towel. Keep rinsing and wiping in this manner until the pan is clean. Once this is done, wipe it completely dry and spread a thin coating of oil over the inside of the skillet. Wipe most of this off with yet another dry paper towel (all these paper towels get repetitive, don’t they? All I can say is, I couldn’t run a kitchen without an abundant supply of paper towels, and I suggest you don’t try to.), and store your skillet wherever it is you store skillets, preferably somewhere dry. Do this every time you use your skillet and you’ll never have any trouble with food sticking, except maybe for hamburger sometimes.
first ran: January 1988
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Text ©1987 by Sam Waring. All rights reserved.