Rice and Beans: The Perfect Meal

This is the century of culinary science, molecular cuisine, and other food fads. It may as well be happening in a parallel universe as far as this blogger is concerned. I had four meals today, three out of which were the same one: rice and beans generously sprinkled with crumbled queso fresco and chopped up fresh cilantro. (I put so much chopped cilantro on top, it may as well be a small salad.) I bet there's a scientific reason why I find this meal so satisfying. Anyone knows what it is?

Here is the recipe for my perfect meal. I make long grain white rice with a bit of salt and butter. No rinsing before or after. The beans are usually pinto beans from a can. I don't just empty a can on top of my rice; I always improvise a base out of whatever I have at hand. Today I sauteed some chopped onion, jalapeno peppers, garlic, and tomatoes, using sunflower oil, with a little chicken broth. Then I simmered that and the beans together after throwing in a bit of Goya's all-purpose Adobo seasoning. Also a bit of chili seasoning.

Rice and beans, a recipe I perfected solely for my palate. For my appetite first as a grad student and now a teacher at the very bottom of the pay scale at my university.

Rice and beans, my protein trampoline.

Songwriters and Poets

No posts since the end of August? I don't want to go into the red tape disaster that's slowly getting disentangled at my job. It suffices to say, a stressed-out blogger is an absent blogger in my case.

I'm now looking forward to the new album by one of my favorite songwriters, Paul Kelly. In the teaser song he's released via his various web sites, he alludes to the good old "Elegy XIX" by John Donne. Here's Paul Kelly, "New Found Year."