Artichoke Tuna Bean Salad

This tasty Artichoke Tuna Bean Salad is easy to toss together but it’s full of flavor and makes a wonderful starter or light meal. 

One pantry staple we are never without is tuna in a can. Many an afternoon I hear the snick-snick of the can opener and either my husband or daughter is opening a can to eat with fork, straight from the can. It’s one of my favorite things to eat as well. 

That said, often of a morning you will find me boiling eggs in the Instant Pot, just to make my southern-style tuna salad. Where I come from, tuna salad has to have boiled eggs in it! I love to eat it on soft sandwich bread or piled high on Triskets. 

Back in my college days, what I called tuna surprise was one of my favorite meals. It required just three ingredients: noodles, cream cheese and a can of tuna. 

Bonus Tuna Surprise recipe: Just boil the noodles and drain. Add the cream cheese to the hot pot of pasta and stir till melted. Add tuna and stir again. This is seriously delicious and a relatively cheap, warm bowl of comfort food. If you want to get fancy, pour the whole pot in a casserole dish and bake till browned on top but that step is not really necessary.

Artichoke Tuna Bean Salad

This recipe is adapted from one in New York Times Cooking. According to the original author, it’s a mainstay in her house since it uses ingredients she usually has on hand for an easy light meal. I added a few ingredients but would still wholeheartedly agree.

Ingredients – Serves 4-6 as a starter

1 jar (6.5 oz or 185g) marinated quartered artichoke hearts, drained and 1/4 cup or 60ml marinade reserved

1 small or 1/2 medium red onion, peeled and very thinly sliced 40g

1 small red chili pepper, minced

2 teaspoons cider vinegar 

1 tablespoon plain Greek yogurt

½ teaspoon Dijon mustard

1 (12-oz or 340g) can water-packed albacore tuna, drained

1 (15-ounce) can cannellini beans or borlotti beans, drained through a strainer and rinsed

Several sprigs Italian parsley leaves, chopped

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Baby spinach to serve, if desired

Method

Place the onion and chili pepper in a bowl and add the vinegar. Leave to marinate. 

Pour the vinegar into 1/4 cup or 60ml of the reserved artichoke marinade and then whisk in the Dijon mustard and yogurt. Add a pinch of fine sea salt and a few good grinds of black pepper.

In a large bowl, combine the artichoke hearts, beans, onion and chili pepper.

Add the tuna and pour on the dressing. Toss gently to coat. Garnish with parsley. 

Serve as is or put a small handful of baby spinach on each plate then top with the artichoke tuna bean salad. 

Enjoy!

It’s the second Friday of the month which means it’s time for my Fish Friday Foodies to share recipes. Today’s theme is Fish from a Can. I love this theme! Canned fish is tasty and convenient. I always have sardines, tuna, anchovies, smoked oysters, salmon, etc. in my pantry so I can’t wait to see all the other canned fish recipes. Check them out below. Many thanks to our host, Wendy of A Day in the Life on the Farm. 

• Food Lust People Love: Artichoke Tuna Bean Salad 
• Sneha’s Recipe: Keto Tuna Melt Chaffle 
• A Day in the Life on the Farm: Smoked Clam Dip 
• Karen’s Kitchen Stories: Spicy Salmon and Potato Croquettes 
• Palatable Pastime: Tuna Melt
• Culinary Cam: Growing an Appreciation for Tinned and Jarred Fish + an Anchovy-Artichoke Egg Salad Recipe

Would you like to join Fish Friday Foodies? We post and share new seafood/fish recipes on the third Friday of the month. To join our group please email Wendy at wendyklik1517 (at) gmail.com. Visit our Facebook page and Pinterest page for more wonderful fish and seafood recipe ideas.

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Creamy White Bean Mushroom Pasta

This Creamy White Bean Mushroom Pasta is full of flavor from brown butter, baby bella mushrooms and a healthy helping of salty feta. Comfort food for sure!

Let me just say right now that this is not the prettiest dish I’ve ever made. Those dark mushrooms are super flavorful, cooked in brown butter, but they aren’t very attractive. Would I prefer some golden chanterelles for this? Of course. But who can afford that many chanterelles? If only they weren’t so expensive.

No worries though because I can assure you that when you taste this pasta, its looks won’t matter! 

I’m often on the lookout for meat-free meals that are made with plant proteins like beans and legumes and are, of course, super tasty. That way no one misses the meat. This dish feels indulgently creamy because of the blended beans but when divided between six people, the calorie count per portion is quite reasonable. If you've been eating too many holiday treats, this dish will help balance that out.

Creamy White Bean Mushroom Pasta

This recipe is adapted from a vegan one on BiancaZapatka.com. I had good intentions on keeping it vegan but I didn’t have any non-dairy cream. And if I was going to use cow cream anyway, I might as well brown some butter, right? In for a penny, in for a pound, the feta at the end boosted the creaminess, salt and flavor. Its addition was also a good decision.

Ingredients to serve six

1 lb or 450g pasta of your choice (I like linguine.)

For the sauce:

1/4 cup or 60g butter

2 lbs or 900g baby bella mushrooms 

1/2 large onion (about 5.1 oz or 145g)

4 cloves garlic

1 can (15oz or 425g) white beans, drained and rinsed (I used navy beans.)

2 tablespoons nutritional yeast

2/3 cup or 155ml cream

1/2 cup or 120ml vegetable broth

7 oz or 200g feta cheese, crumbled

Freshly ground black pepper

For garnish:

fresh parsley, optional

To serve:

Freshly grated Parmesan or Pecorino Romano cheese, optional

Method

Clean the mushrooms and cut off any hard stem ends. Slice a third of them, cut the second third in bite-sized pieces and chop the last third. (Or cut them all one way. I just like the mix of textures when they are cooked.)

Peel and dice the onion finely. Peel and roughly chop the garlic cloves.

Rinse and drain the white beans and blend them with the cream, nutritional yeast and chopped garlic cloves in a food processor or with a hand blender until smooth. If the mixture is too thick to blend smooth, you can thin it with some of the vegetable stock. It’s all going into the pan together eventually.

Heat the butter in a pan and cook until the milk solids separate and the butter browns. 

If you need better instructions on browning butter, check out this link: https://www.cookingactress.com/2013/04/browned-butter-how-to.html My friend, Kayle, will show you how to do it. 

Add the mushrooms to the brown butter and pop the lid on your pan. 

Cook covered until the mushrooms release their liquid, stirring occasionally. This takes just a few minutes over a high heat.

Take the lid off the pan and keep cooking them until the liquid evaporates and the mushrooms are relatively dry and golden.

Add in the diced onions and sauté for about 2-3 minutes or until they are softened and translucent.

In the meantime, cook the pasta in salted water according to the package instructions.

Once the onions have softened, add the vegetable broth and the bean puree to the pan. 

Stir well. Bring the sauce to a boil then turn it down to simmer for a few minutes.

Add in the crumbled feta and a few grinds of black pepper. 

Stir to combine and warm the feta through.

Once the pasta is al dente, drain off the cooking water. Toss the pasta with the sauce to serve.

Garnish with chopped parsley if desired and put freshly grated Parmesan on the table so folks can help themselves.

Enjoy! 

It’s Sunday FunDay and today we are all sharing pasta for the holidays. Check out all the links below. Many thanks to our host, Sue of Palatable Pastime. 

• Christmas Penne Pasta from Making Miracles
• Creamy Basil Sauce Served With Spaghetti Pasta -Vegetarian from Sneha’s Recipe
• Creamy White Bean Mushroom Pasta from Food Lust People Love
• Shrimp and Crab Stuffed Shells from Palatable Pastime
• Spinach Ravioli with Pan Fried Scallops from Our Good Life
• Tenderloin Tips over Lemony Pappardelle from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Tortellini Soup with Sausage & Kale from Amy’s Cooking Adventures
• Pasta with Roasted Tomato Sauce from Mayuri’s Jikoni

We are a group of food bloggers who believe that Sunday should be a family fun day, so every Sunday we share recipes that will help you to enjoy your day. If you're a blogger interested in joining us, just visit our Facebook group and request to join.

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Creamy Lima Beans with Bacon and Mustard

Posh beans on toast! These Lima Beans with Bacon and Mustard are creamy and soft and utterly more-ish. Plus they take hardly any time at all to make. 

Do you write in cookbooks or is writing in books verboten in your house? I must confess that while I wouldn’t write in a novel, I do make notes in my cookbooks, in pencil. How else am I going to remember what I actually did since I have a hard time following a recipe word for word? 

Cookbooks, even my favorite ones by my favorite authors, are jumping off points to improving a dish and making it suit our palates and available ingredients. 

Case in point is the recipe I’m sharing today, adapted from Nigel Slater’s The 30-Minute Cook. The first time I made it, I added the following pencil scrawl to the bottom:

“Very good over crusty bread. Next time: add more wine & cream. Serve over rice.” 

And the next time, I did just that! And it was so good! The orange on top is my homemade habanero sauce and extra Parmesan was also a good decision. If you don’t have this cookbook, I can highly recommend looking for a secondhand copy online. 

Creamy Lima Beans with Bacon and Mustard

This recipe serves two but is easily scaled up for more. It’s perfect for a weeknight or a light lunch, on its own or with a small salad on the side. 

Ingredients

1 can (14 oz or 400g) lima beans

4 slices smoked bacon

1 tablespoon canola or other light oil

1 shallot or small onion

1/2 cup or 120ml dry white wine

1/4 cup or 60m heavy cream

1 tablespoon wholegrain mustard

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

2 1/2 oz or 70g extra sharp cheddar, grated

To serve: 2 slices crusty bread, toasted (and buttered, if desired)

Method

Pour out the liquid from the can of lima beans and rinse them with cool water. Set them aside in the sieve to drain. 

Cut the bacon into small strips and finely dice the onion. 

In a large frying pan, cook the bacon in the oil until the bits are crispy. Add the onion and cook, stirring often, until it softens and turns translucent. 

Spoon out any excess fat and add the beans to the pan, along with the white wine. 

Bring the liquid to a boil and then turn the heat down to simmer. Simmer until the liquid has reduced by half. 

Add in the cream and the mustards. Give it a good stir and turn the heat back up to get it just boiling again.

Then simmer for a couple of minutes. Stir in the grated cheese and simmer till it melts into the sauce. 

To serve, spoon over toasted crusty bread, buttered, if desired. 

Enjoy!

Today I’m joining my Festive Foodie friends to celebrate National Cookbook Month by sharing recipes from our favorites. Check out the links below. Many thanks to our host, Jolene of Jolene’s Recipe Journal.

• Betty Crocker Blueberry Muffins by Art of Natural Living
• BBQ Chicken Tortilla Wraps by A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Carrot Cake Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting by An Affair from the Heart
• Chickpea Tortilla Soup by Jolene's Recipe Journal
• Chocolate Crepes by That Recipe
• Joanna Gaines Chocolate Chip Cookies by Jen Around the World
• French Classics Made Easy: Savory Stuffed Crepes by Our Good Life
• German Chocolate Cookies by Blogghetti
• Helga's Meatballs by Palatable Pastime
• Lima Beans with Bacon and Mustard by Food Lust People Love
• Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins by Family Around the Table
• Vegan Green Loobia Polo by Magical Ingredients
• Wild Rice and Onion Bread by Karen's Kitchen Stories

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Easy Black Beans with Smoked Sausage

A traditional meal in the Carioca, that is to say Rio de Janeiro - area of Brazil, black beans with smoked sausage and rice is a tasty staple that will fill you up and bring you comfort.

Moving on is about discovering new places and making new friends. But it is also about finding homes in your new house for memorabilia and treasures from past lives. I have always told my girls that home is where we are together. But, for me, home is also where the special things are.

My mother and my mother-in-law are both collectors of treasure. I saw their houses from a young age (yes, I was friends with my mother-in-law before I started dating her son) and, while the things they had amassed were beautiful, I vowed quietly to myself that I would be more cautious. I would choose a piece or two from each place we lived and make that piece count. I don’t mean to imply that all of their things weren’t special, just that I was looking for a simpler, less cluttered life.

Our first overseas move was Singapore but we didn’t get a shipment and, frankly, we had all kinds of furniture already from the Far East since dear husband came to the relationship with Korean hibachi tables and Chinese cabinets with tiny drawers, a carved wooden Indian room divider screen and even a big Chinese gong.

Our second posting was Sydney and we bought one item: an antique over-mantel piece with a small stained glass cabinet. It cost as much to ship back to the US as it did to buy it. Worth ever penny.

Our purchases in the next location, Abu Dhabi, were primarily Persian carpets. The first was a 3ft x 5ft Tabriz that cost us US$800. A fortune in those days, the last of the ‘80s, for two kids just out of university a few years. The carpet had an identical twin, very unusual, and it is one of our regrets that we didn’t buy them both. But, Lordy, $800 for one! Two was unthinkable! We still kick ourselves over that decision, almost 30 years on.

We moved around for the next few years, judicially, carefully, adding “recuerdos” to our collection. An antique Dutch clock in Balikpapan, Indonesia and a small elegant chandelier from the Marché aux Puces in Paris. Then for five and a half years we called Brazil home.

Early on, I saw a dish I wanted, coveted in Biblical proportions. I confess that sin. Although I guess, technically, it did not belong to my neighbor. Instead, it was at a pottery shop, an hour or two from my house, en route elsewhere, so I wasn’t tortured unduly.

This dish was large! Almost 24 inches from end to end, in a big, brightly colored, hand-painted oval design of peaceful blues and greens. Boy, did I want it. But we all have limits on what we will pay for something. This dish, more that 20 years ago, was beyond my comfort zone at US$100, especially for something decorative, because I could not imagine ever baking anything in a dish so large and pretty. 

So I went back occasionally to visit it and lusted. Through those years, and the magic of devaluation the real fell to almost 50 percent of its initial inflated value and, just before we moved from Brazil, the dish was mine. It has had pride of place in our living room since then.

Until now.

The movers in Kuala Lumpur were simply not careful enough in packing this up for our move to Egypt.

When my heart is heavy, I cook. The only meal appropriate after the discovery of the devastation was black beans with sausage and rice. I had to celebrate Brazil and bring back a happy memory because this one was so painful. Yes, I know it was only a thing, but it represented so much more. A wish fulfilled, a country missed.

Easy Black Beans with Smoked Sausage

In Brazil, beans and rice accompany almost any other dish that might be served. Lasagna for dinner, also beans and rice. Fried chicken, beans and rice on the side. Grilled meats, bring on the beans. We found it most extraordinary when we arrived, but we came to realize that unless there were beans and rice to fill you up, it just wasn't really considered a complete meal there. 

Ingredients
16 oz bag or a little less than 1/2 kilo dried black beans (If your bag is 500g, not problem, just hum the whole thing in.)
At least 14 oz or 400g smoked sausage (More is more in this case!)
4-5 cloves of garlic
2 bay leaves
Sea salt
Black pepper
Cayenne pepper
14 oz or 398g can cooked black beans

To serve: White rice cooked following package instructions or your favorite method.

Method
Pick carefully through the dried black beans removing any stones or clumps of dirt. Even the best brands have them, so do not skip this step.  Best case scenario if you miss a clump, is gritty beans. Worst case scenario if you miss a stone is a trip to the dentist with a broken tooth.

All the stones and clumps I found, with one bean for comparison.

Rinse the beans with some warm water and drain.

Slice the sausage into 1cm or 1/2 inch rounds.

Add the beans, garlic, bay leaves and sausage to your pressure cooker.

Eye the pot and add twice as much cold water as you have beans. Add about a teaspoon of salt and a good sprinkle of both peppers. Some smoked sausages are saltier than others so we don’t want to add too much actual salt right at the beginning.

N.B. If you are watching your salt intake, wait till the beans are cooked to add the salt. For those who don't use much salt, the seasonings from the sausage may be enough for you.

Put the lid on the pressure cooker and heat on high until it starts to make that loud ch-ch-ch noise that means it is boiling and under pressure. Turn the heat down till the ch-ch is just a gentle chug of a slow train.

Cook like this for about 35-40 minutes and then remove the pressure cooker from the heat. Allow it to cool until it is safe to open. Give the beans a good stir.

Put the pressure cooker back on the stove on a medium heat, without the lid, and cook to reduce the liquid by one or two inches or two to four centimeters and to finish cooking the beans.

Meanwhile, rinse the canned beans in some cool water and mash them completely with a potato masher. (You could also choose to cook a few more ounces or grams of beans and scoop the extra out with a slotted spoon and mash them. I find this easier because one whole bag plus one whole can makes the perfect thickness for me.)

Add them into the pressure cooker and stir vigorously to incorporate them. This will thicken the bean mixture.

Check the seasonings and add more salt and pepper if necessary. Serve over white rice with hot sauce on the side for those who want some extra spice.

Enjoy!

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