Dry Bean Preparation

I acquired this "back to basics" recipe a few years ago visiting Cd'A. Preface: some areas of ID have higher percentage of Mormon families in the city populations than SLC, and Cd'A is one of those places. There is a great store next to the WW in Hayden called Wishful Kneads. It is run by a Mormon couple that share the experience of their teachings when it comes to food prep, self sufficiency, and storage by offering tons of classes ranging from homemade canned soups to sandwich bread to good ol' beans and rice (and other grains). Their store is great-it's all local as can be, floor to ceiling shelves loaded with flour, grains, yeast, jams and syrups made locally from MT, relishes, kitchen tools for efficiency.

Trying to decide what to buy there is a huge problem for me. I'd love to order the whole store and bring it back home with me.

I was able to talk with the store owners a bit and glean some insight from them as to how to prep basic supplies. Favouring is totally up to you: spices, herbs (boquet garni being my favourite--especially because you don't have to chop tiny herbs up for what seems like hours!), veggie combos (like "The Holy Trinity"), and depending on the season which cooking liquids you'd use.

Here then is the prep for any dried bean. The only cross reference check i need to make is with Alton Brown's bean prep regarding black beans--apparently they don't need to soak as long.

Other basic preparations to follow for the common food staples.