Dried beans are a great pantry item to keep well stocked so you always have protein on hand. Canned beans are already budget friendly, but dried beans are just pennies on the dollar. These protein-packed legumes are great for your health and your wallet!

While cooking dried beans requires a little more planning than canned beans, one pound of dried black beans will yield around six cups of cooked black beans, which allows you to prepare a large batch all at once that you can then use in a variety of different meals or freeze for later use. If you’ve never cooked dried beans from scratch before, this video will show you that it is a relatively straightforward process!

As with most things in the kitchen, there is not one “right way” to cook dried beans. You can soak them ahead of time and cook on the stovetop, cook them in a slow cooker, cook them in a pressure cooker, etc. Tell us your favorite way in the comments!

Prep time 10 mins | Total time 2.5 hours | Yield: 6 cups cooked beans

Instructions:

1. Sift through beans, checking for rocks or clumps of dirt.
2. Rinse beans.
3. Put beans into a large pot, then add water until beans are submerged 1-2 inches below water.
4. Bring pot to a boil, then reduce heat, allowing pot to simmer for 10 minutes.
5. Turn off burner and let sit for 1 hour. Prepare any ingredients you would like to cook and flavor the beans with, such as salt, garlic, onion, or bay leaves.
6. Add more water until beans are again submerged 1-2 inches.
7. Add any additional ingredients.
8. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer; cook beans until they are soft (about one hour).

If not eating immediately, let beans cool in the pot, then transfer beans and their liquid to airtight containers where they will keep for about  one week refrigerated or three months frozen.

Watch Elizabeth’s cooking demo & try it yourself!