I think I found my new home!

[frau kaleun]

Originally Posted by Sailor Steve

That opened my eyes to something. I get free canned stuff, don't have the space to grow anything and never think to shop for fresh. I have several cans of green beans and peas, and I never open them. I think that link told my why. I never had to be told to eat my veggies. My mom was from Texas and, as said previously, knew how to cook, especially with a pan. I think now I don't like eating veggies because I don't know how to cook them. Bacon and onions? Who knew? I'm betting even the canned stuff I have stored would benefit from a little of that. Now I get to try it.

You don't even need to put the bacon and onions in the pot. My mom never did, but she DID put bacon grease in with the beans. I'm only putting in the bacon because I had to buy it anyway to fry it to get the grease. And the onion because why not? It sounds good. But if you like the onion flavor you could just toss a little onion powder in the pot, or buy a can of those french fried onions and sprinkle some on top when you dish the beans out.

If you have canned beans naturally you're not going to have to cook them down but toss them in the pot and make sure there's enough liquid to cover (either from the can, or add water as needed) and then put your bacon grease in there and then put it on the burner until it's all heated through and the grease is completely liquified and distributed throughout.

Heck, for all I know they now sell bacon flavored Crisco or some such that can be used for the flavor element and you don't even need to buy the bacon and fry it.

I always wondered why beans and greens like spinach in other places never tasted as good as what we got at home... then one day my sister said, "duh, mom put bacon grease in all that stuff."

I haven't done anything like it since, mainly because I live alone and am too lazy to spend all day cooking. Now I'm wondering...

If you have room for it, you might want to think about getting a slow cooker (aka a crock pot). You can do pot roast, chili, soups and stews, and all manner of things in one of those. The only time investmest is for prepping the ingredients and once they're in the pot you turn it on and it cooks for several hours and the whole point is that you DON'T mess with it until it's done, and when it is all you do is take out your food and eat it and put the leftovers away for later.

I make pot roast in mine all the time, I prep everything the day before and put it in the pot and stick that in the fridge overnight. The next morning it goes in the cooker on low and it takes 9-10 hours so by the time I get home from work and am ready to eat it's done. It's maybe an hour at most getting the taters and carrots ready and browning the roast, and if I didn't insist on browning the roast (which isn't necessary) it wouldn't even be that much -just whatever it takes to dice up the potatoes and peel and chop the carrots.