comfort food

my new favorite meal to make is beans. strange, huh? i have never been into beans. ever. i could tolerate refried beans only if they were mixed with rice or something, not plain. and i certainly did not eat whole beans (except green beans. i love green beans). if there were kidney beans in my soup, i swallowed them whole. but, all of a sudden, i am obsessed with beans. i am trying to be a better cook and beans are quite easy (and cheap). plus, i love having a pot cooking on the stove for hours at a time. on cold days, it gives me the warm and fuzzies. i have started with pinto beans and i hope to work my way through all the beans eventually.

last week, i used the pioneer woman recipe for beans but my husband added half an onion to it and it seemed to make them more flavorful. this week, i used pw's recipe again (which, according to my husband, is nutty to even be using a recipe for beans but...i'm new to this stuff) but i cut it in half because the whole recipe made enough beans for the neighborhood. i did make the following adjustments, however, and i think it improved the flavor dramatically:
~ the recipe calls for 4 slices of thick-cut bacon. i had 6 pieces and i didn't want to bag the remaining 2 for later so i used all 6 (which is why it looks like a just have a pot of bacon)
~ i added half an onion, sliced
~ i forgot i was cutting the recipe in half when i added salt and i ended up adding 1 tsp salt. i use kosher salt which just seems to taste better.
~ i also added 2 tsp of pepper. the beans had a tiny bit of a kick which is what made them so good, i think.
~ i added the salt and pepper with the beans, bacon and water. i just noticed i wasn't supposed to add it until the end.
these were really, really good. i think i am going to stick to my variation of the recipe from now on. well, i might delete the bacon just to make them a little bit healthier.

so typically you'd eat cornbread with beans but i have been on a flour tortilla kick for a couple of weeks now. i spent many summers in mexico and it seems like my fondest memories revolve around tortillas...flour and corn. i have always been a sucker for homemade flour tortillas. the only problem, they are hard to find. there is a famous whole in the wall {authentic} restaurant where i live that makes delicious tortillas daily but you typically have to stand in a long line just to get some. and sometimes they don't have any extra for sale. the ones they sell at the mexican market taste just like the ones they sell at the regular grocery store and, if you have ever had a homemade flour tortilla, you know those just don't taste very good. oh sure, some people might say to visit the tourist mexican town but...that only works in a pinch and when you're willing to shell out a buck per tortilla. even then, it's not the one i'm looking for. in the end, i decided to try pw's tortilla recipe. they aren't too bad. my first attempt was a pathetic one partly because i used whole wheat flour and i had difficulty rolling out the dough. they were edible but not what i wanted. i decided to try again and, oh my, what a turn-around. they were delicious! i kind of wish i had not discovered this recipe because now i will be tempted to make them more often than i should. if you make them, you should really use the lard. no exception. and you should buy the lard at the mexican market. really. and if the mexican market sells farmer john, just head on over to the next market because that one is clearly not a real mexican market. i used farmer john and you can tell the difference. i can tell you i won't be making these for at least a couple of months or so.