Frijoles Negros Refritos, Tex-Mex Refried Black Beans
Refried beans get their name from a mistranslation. Frijoles refritos means well fried, not fried twice, and the whole technique is simply cooked beans mashed in a hot pan until they thicken and gloss over. The traditional gloss comes from lard, but it does not have to. Black beans are full of their own starch, and mashing them over heat with a little of their cooking liquid pulls that starch out until the beans turn creamy and hold a shape on the plate. Epazote is the one ingredient worth hunting for, a pungent Mexican herb that grows like a weed and gives black beans their characteristic backbone. Cook the beans yourself from dried so you control the salt, spread them under everything from grain bowls to roasted vegetables, and freeze what you do not use.
Ingredients
- 3 1/2 cups Black beans, cooked from dried, drained, liquid reserved
- 1 Yellow onion, finely diced
- 4 cloves Garlic, minced
- 1 Serrano, minced
- 1 tsp Cumin seed, toasted and ground
- 2 sprigs Epazote, leaves chopped
- 1/2 tsp Black peppercorns, ground
- 1 tbsp Lime juice
Method
- Sweat the onion in 3 tablespoons (45 ml) water in a wide pan over medium heat until soft and translucent, about 8 minutes. Water does the same job as the lard here, softening the onion so it melts into the beans instead of standing out.
- Add the garlic, serrano, and ground cumin and cook one more minute until fragrant. Adding them after the onion keeps the garlic from scorching, which would turn it bitter.
- Tip in the drained black beans with a splash of their reserved cooking liquid. Cooking your own beans from dried, unsalted, is what keeps the sodium near zero, since canned beans carry most of their salt in the can.
- Mash with a potato masher or the back of a spoon over the heat, adding bean liquid a little at a time. The starch in the beans thickens as it cooks down, giving the glossy body that fat usually provides.
- Stir in the epazote and cook until the beans pull away from the pan in a soft mass. Epazote is the herb that makes black beans taste like Mexico, faintly of anise and mint, and it settles the beans in more ways than one.
- Finish with black pepper and lime. Taste. The beans should read savory and rich, so the lime and chile stand in for salt. Loosen with more bean liquid if they stiffen on standing.
Nutrition
Estimated per serving: 150 calories, 8 g protein, 8 g fiber, 15 mg sodium. Computed from USDA FoodData Central reference values for the main ingredients. This is an approximation, not a laboratory measurement. How these are computed.
Cost per serving is estimated from US national-average retail prices for cheap staple forms, using BLS dried-bean prices and USDA produce prices. Prices vary by store and season, so treat it as a guide, not a receipt. How this is computed.
