I won’t lie to you –this beef stew is pretty ugly. Ugly enough that I sized the picture down, hoping I wouldn’t scare you away with it! But looks can be deceiving! It’s actually quite tasty, and if you have folks in your house who won’t touch a pinto bean, they may just go for this! –Mellyn P.S. 2 family reviews follow the recipe below!
Yield: About 8 cups
- ½ cup pinto bean flour (if you’d like to use kidney beans, click here first and look for my entry dated November 1, 2011!)
- 4 cups water
- 1 Tbsp onion powder
- ¼ tsp thyme
- 4 tsp beef bouillon
- ½ cup dehydrated carrots
- 1/3 cup rice, uncooked**
- 1 can green beans
- 3 cups additional water
- 1 or 2 13-ounce cans beef (optional…I didn’t use it)
- Whisk bean flour into water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and let simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Add onion, thyme, bouillon, carrots, rice, green beans, beef (if desired) and additional water.
- Return to boiling. Reduce heat and simmer for about 15 minutes or until rice and carrots are soft.
**If you want to add rice that’s already cooked, add about 1 cup at the end. You could also leave out the rice and add cooked wheat berries, lentils, barley, quinoa or any other quick-cooking grain.
Anne said, “Nobody suspected it was a bean base. I added an extra can of pinto beans that were blended up to thicken it, and a tablespoon of wheat flour for the same reason. We like ours really thick. I also added extra bouillon, about a tablespoon, but that’s probably because I added extra beans. DH complained about the rice instead of our usual potatoes, but our 3-year old had two bowls full; everybody else ate one bowl without complaining. So I would definitely add it to my list of dinners to make, switch it out for my old beef stew and make it with potatoes instead.”
Amy said, “The texture was normal with the ground beans, it didn’t bother us at all. We still thought it was a little beef brothy but that is something we can play around with ourselves. It wasn’t our favorite (made us think, yes this is a food storage meal), but it would be a good option when you needed to eat food storage meals.”
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