Weekending and oven cooked beans

What a whirlwind this week has been, my little boy has been sick and snotty so the week ground to a halt while i took care of him. Work just had to be pushed aside and the house looks suitably as it should when caring for a sick boy - trashed. I am so grateful to be able to shift my life around easily enough to care for him as he needs it. I did manage to try my hand at making cottage cheese though. Looks good doesn't it?

Unfortunately that is where the goodness ends, it was like rubber. Milky tasteless rubber. I'm not sure what i did, this recipe used a mesophilic culture and rennet. It came together well and separated easily but just wasn't pleasant to eat. The cooked curd did soften overnight in the fridge but was still not nice. A bit of research so far has suggested maybe i cooked the curd too long or had the temperature too high. I think i'll have to investigate this further and see what i can find. I might try cream cheese this week and see how that goes.

Also over the weekend I did manage to get to a nursing conference before succumbing to illness myself. So today was a quiet day at home, filled with naps and a bit of stockpiling for the freezer. Yum lots of freshly cooked black beans and chickpeas for the freezer.

Easy oven cooked black beans

I'm loving the oven method for cooking black beans, it's easy and you don't have to watch over it. All you do is soak the black beans overnight. In the morning strain the beans and put into an oven dish, cover the beans fully with water and add 2 t salt. Cover the dish and put into the oven at 180 degrees C for 90mins until soft. Easy and no pots to boil dry while you're distracted with a bubba. Very important!

I hope you all had a great weekend. xx