Summer reporting, and a recipe to change the heart of a black bean hater

Coconut espresso, anyone?

I am kind of in love with that picture right now. I do admit my friend did the latte art on this one; I was just the lowly photographer. This is the result of messing around with espresso and finding a random coconut out and about.

Shot numba two:


Summer has been pretty boring and slow. I am somewhere semi-new, living at my parents' for a few months out in the middle-of-nowhere-South. I just graduated college, but it wasn't supposed to be sad. However, life as I know it has disappeared and I have to start up almost everything new. It's depressing. Training for my new jobbie starts Saturday though, and that's 30 hours a week. I'm actually excited about getting busy. It took extreme boredom to get me to this point - excitement about being productive!?! This is a foreign concept! I was anticipating finishing school so I could get a moment to breathe. Guess I've had enough?

In the last couple months of school I stumbled upon the self-serve frozen-yogurt-with-toppings trend. I would flock to the yogurt joint - along with eager middle schoolers, because they all hang out there too - to get my fill sorbet and load on the fresh fruit, coconut, assorted nuts, and Oreo crumbles. I got really good at convincing almost anyone to go with me, and if I couldn't, I could bike 4.7 miles there, get my icy fix, and then bike back for a nice little outdoors breather/workout! Unfortunately, my location of delightful frozen bliss has been stolen from me since I graduated and moved, and all the frozen yogurt joints here are lame-o and don't have anything dairy-free, so I took matters into my own hands...

...and created this at home:

Ciao Bella mango sorbet, blackberries, blueberries, cranberries, bananas, hemp seeds, raw cashews, and crumbled mini Oreos

Yuuuuuum! The hot weather has me wanting this stuff all the time. And it's such a filling snack too!

I don't have much interesting to say, other than that today and yesterday has had me bored out of my mind, literally to the point of craziness. I am ready for something exciting to happen!

A recipe I made up a few months ago was sitting in my Blogger draft posts list, so I decided to reveal it to all of you, thus benefitting the rest of the world with my random food creations. I wrote the rest of this text a few months ago, which explains the change in voice from the rest of this post. (Please don't kill me for not having a picture!) Here goes:

I can never find ways to use up entire cans of black beans and end up throwing them out after leftover beanies sit stagnant in my fridge for seven days. I'll try a recipe, not really like it, and then tell myself I'll figure out a way to use the rest later. It never happens.

Until now.

Here my friends, I have had a momentary instance of culinary black bean genius. It's actually really simple and not much of a commitment:

Quick Open-Faced Black Bean Sammie
Serves 1

Heaping 1/2 cup cooked black beans (rinsed if canned)
1/3 medium sweet potato, cooked (in microwave on potato setting or in oven; remove skin after cooking and eat it! Fiber is good for you!)
1/4 red bell pepper, chopped
1 Tablespoon vital wheat gluten (optional but yummy)
Salt to taste (I used 2 dashes and 'twas perfecto)
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/4 teaspoon cumin
Dash garlic powder (or fresh minced garlic if you want to get messy)
1/2 teaspoon olive oil, divided (*see very end of instructions for clarification)
2 slices of your favorite bread

Toast the bread before or during prep. Ruby Red tip: I don't have a toaster, but I buy fresh sliced bread and freeze it; when I want a few pieces, I will "toast" each side by sliding them right onto the middle oven rack preheated to 375 degrees F. I will "toast" for four minutes on each side. Perfect.

Okay, now for the real recipe. Mash your sweet potatoes. Mix all other ingredients with the sweet potatoes except olive oil. Microwave for 1 minute 30 seconds. (This is a fast meal and it tasted great nuked, even though I can be a snob if I feel like it when it comes to microwave cooking. Most of the time, for reheating, I use the oven instead.)

Mix ingredients again. Plop half of the mixture on each slice of toasted bread. *Finish this open-face sandwich with a drizzle of 1/4 teaspoon olive oil over the bean mixture on each slice of bread. SO GOOD. Try this recipe now and thank me later. Serve with a side or two and call it lunch!