Curried Bean Salad | 101 Cookbooks

I had a nice weekend at home; although it was spent stripping wallpaper, removing wall paper glue, sanding the walls, prepping the walls, cutting in the paint on the walls, and then finally painting the walls; when it was done, it was done, and I knew there was not another square inch of wall paper left in the house that needed removal. This was a good feeling.

Watching Notre Dame pull off a win in their first game of the season, albeit not an impressive win, but a win, was a good feeling.

Getting a 7.5 mile run in on Sunday morning was a good feeling.

Watching Tom Brady go down clutching his knee in agony on Sunday afternoon was definitely not a good feeling. I've graduated from denial into acceptance. I'm a firm believer that everything happens for a reason....I don't know what the reason is for this, possibly for Bill to show the country what a great coach he is no matter who his quarterback is. Maybe it's so Matt Cassell who's been playing second fiddle to someone ever since he was in high school can shine and make a name and a career for himself, or maybe it's just to make the season more interesting. Whatever it is, I feel bad for Tom, the season looks completely different today than it did on Sunday morning, and we'll see what happens.

I've been paying a lot of attention to 101 cookbooks lately because she has such a great collection of vegetarian recipes and ideas. I like her style of cooking and every time I visit her website I find something that I tag to make later. I didn't follow this recipe to the ingredient, because I didn't have all the ingredients on hand, but I used it as a guide for what I had in the pantry and refrigerator and I think it came out really well. Here is the original recipe, and below is how I made it with what I had on hand.

1 can black beans

1 can black eyed peas

1 can white beans

1/2 medium red onion sliced into half moons

3/4 cup celery chopped

1 clove garlic

1/2 tsp fine grain sea salt

1 1/2 tsp curry powder

1 tsp finely chopped crystalized ginger

juice and zest of one lemon

1/3 cup olive oil

2 tbsp fresh cilantro chopped

In a large bowl combine beans, red onion, and celery. Make the curry vinaigrette by mashing the garlic clove with the salt into a thick paste. In a bowl or jar whisk together this garlic paste, the curry powder, ginger, lemon juice/zest and olive oil. Whisk well, taste, and add adjust flavors/salt if needed. Pour about half the dressing over the beans and toss to combine,. Add more dressing a bit at a time (i just used the whole thing).

I served this just after I made it, but I think that the left overs tasted much better the next day after the flavors had a chance to meld together.

Rating = Damn Good (better the next day)