I don’t know how it happened. One day I got my class lists and my Metcard and my timetable, the next I’m pulling into my driveway with a computer full of dazzlingly disorganized Excel spreadsheets of marks and attendance, strange bruises on my body, wearing clothes I don’t recognise. My neck hurts and my glasses are scratched. What happened to me?
Somewhere in between my ladies came over for dinner, and when I was writing this entry in my head I had an honest-to-goodness crisis about whether I should frame this entry as yet another ladeez night, for fear that it would come across a touch ‘Women be shopping! A good man is hard to find! I like chocolate and ‘Greys Anatomy’!’ But I did have my ladies over, and they all had similar work-related thousand yard stares, and we did our nails and watched ‘The Wire’ and plotted future evenings when we make ourselves real pretty and go out to bars we don’t normally go to and try to get men in suits to buy us drinks, simply because none of us have received a drink from a man in a suit and we feel that’s an experience we should have before the boobs go and we’re all too tired and cynical to even try any more.
I made crispy black bean tacos and a strawberry version of my hazelnut and cream cheese tart. I need a lie down. And also a scotch.
Crispy black bean tacos with feta and cabbage
Adapted from Bon Appetit. Serves 4.
- 400g tin of black beans. Since tinned black beans are scarce around these parts, I tried out the 90 minute no-soak bean cooking method that’s been going around the traps. It worked a treat. All you do is preheat the oven to 250, put your desired quantity of beans in a cast iron casserole dish, cover with water and bring to the boil on the stove. Once it’s boiled, put the lid on and transfer to the oven to bake for around 75 minutes. After 75 minutes they should be done. I put on 400g of dried beans and froze the leftovers. 90 minute no-soak, you guys
- 1 tsp ground cumin or more. I love cumin
- Juice of half a lime
- 1/2 a small cabbage, any colour, finely sliced or passed through the slicing disc of a food processor
- 2 spring onions, sliced
- Half a bunch of coriander, roughly chopped
- A quantity of corn tortillas suitable to your needs
- 100g feta, crumbled
Put beans and cumin in a bowl along with salt, pepper and a slug of olive oil and roughly mash together. Combine another slug of olive oil with the lime juice in another bowl and add the cabbage, spring onions and coriander.
Spray a non-stick frying pan with oil and put over high heat. Throw on a tortilla and allow it to warm for a minute, then spread a couple of spoonfuls of bean mixture along one half and cook for a minute. Fold in half then cook the other side until golden brown and crispy. Repeat with remaining tortillas and beans. Fill tacos with feta and corianderish coleslaw and try to regain your strength.
Share This
