Refried Beans

This is a recipe based on one by Thomasina Miers in her Mexican cookbooks. I have made a few tweaks on it as a result of playing around with it when not using the original recipe. This is the way I always make these beans now.

Ingredients

1tbsp butter

1 tbsp lard

1 onion, finely chopped

2 cloves of garlic, crushed

1 bay leaf

1-2 tsp chipotle paste, to taste

1 star anise

1 can black beans, plus the liquid inside the can

oregano, to taste

Put the butter and lard in a pot and melt. Feel free to substitute with oil if you are vegie or vegan.

Add the onion, bay leaf and star anise. Cook on medium heat until the onion becomes soft and starts browning. Add the garlic and chipotle paste. Cook for another minute. 

Turn the heat down to low and add the beans with their liquid. Cook for at least 15-20 minutes, but the longer you cook them the better the flavour. If it starts looking dry and sticking to the bottom of the pan, add a little more water.

Add oregano to taste near the end of cooking and stir in. Cook for another 1 to 2 minutes.

Remove the bay leaf and star anise before serving with nachos, tacos, in burgers, fajitas and other Mexican dishes.

You can either blitz this into a smooth paste or leave it chunky. I do either depending on how lazy I am in regards to extra washing up afterwards.

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Suggestions

Alternatively, chop up some cooking chorizo until it turns crispy and has released its fat into the pot. Then proceed with the rest of the recipe from the onions onwards. There is no need to use extra fat, so you can skip this step altogether. There is plenty released from the chorizo.

If serving as a dip, sprinkle some feta cheese on top. Feta is quite salty, so go easy on any seasoning you use during cooking.

I was playing around some time ago in trying to make vegetable peel crisps from butternut squash rinds by seasoning them with Mexican based herbs and spices, drizzling with oil and baking till crisp. I had some left over the next day, so used them in the refried beans and blitzed everything together. The whole thing turned out rather tasty, plus no waste and extra nutrients!