Black Beans with Mango Puree over Brown Rice, Guacamole and Sungold Tomatoes (Almost No Added Fat)

I wanted to get dinner going and decided on a cold bean salad with avocado (then later decided to just make it guacamole, which we all love). My wife brought home some fresh corn on the cob, so that could be a nice side.

However, I wanted to get dinner going and hadn't soaked any beans. I wanted to use cannelini beans or maybe baby navy beans, but didn't have them. I decided to use black beans, instead. A friend has a "zero minute" pressure cooking technique that I thought I'd try out for when beans aren't soaked. Here is what I did. (I served a non-trivial amount of guacamole, so list this meal as almost no added fat.)


Ingredients

• 1 cup black beans
• Clove of garlic, finely (1/8") diced
• Vegan bouillon cube
• Ample water to cook beans with
• 1/4 t (or to taste) salt
• Few tablespoonfuls of mango puree

Process

1. I rinsed the beans then put them in my Instant Pot pressure cooker and cooked for "zero" minutes, as described above.
2. I let the pressure come down (so the beans were still cooking) then carefully released remaining pressure to open the pot. I rinsed the beans again.
3. I added the garlic, bouillon cube, and enough water to cover the black beans plus another 1/4", then cooked for 30 minutes.
4. When I was ready to serve, I gently released remaining pressure, and mixed the salt in to the beans.
5. I served atop brown rice. My wife had made some mango puree, which I used to top the beans with. I also served homemade guacamole and (yay, now in season!) sungold tomatoes.

Results

Dinner was good. My wife didn't favor the mango with bean combination, but liked it well enough to enjoy.

Ideas for the future

I should experiment with making savory fruit toppings to beans, maybe by mixing in some jerk seasoning or chunks of squash, perhaps.