Beans And Greens of Necessity
Picking beans. Homestead, Florida, 1939, Courtesy of the Florida Memory Project
One could say some ate like vegetarians during the Lenten season as a spiritual discipline. Others ate like vegetarians out of financial necessity because eating the beans you canned over the summer, winter greens and herbs from your garden, eggs from your chickens, and dairy products from your own cow allowed you to feed your family. Basing one's diet exclusively on vegetables is a modern concept. Historically only the poor survived on a plant-based diet out of necessity.
Famous Black Bean Soup Recipe
Ingredients
1 ½ pound black beans
3 ½ quarts water
1 large onion minced
3 tablespoons olive oil
Salt
1 bay leaf
Instructions
Select beans and wash with cold water. Boil in water in glazed pottery pot for an hour. Then remove this water and put in another three quarts of boiling water. Season with salt, onion, [olive oil and bay leaf]. Cook in covered pot on slow fire until very tender. Stir occasionally so that they will not stick to bottom of pot. The boiling ought to be slow and constant to avoid their becoming tough. Add a little boiling water as needed. The beans ought to be well cooked, whole, and with a little soup. Saute minced onion add to beans an hour before serving; keep hot on a moderate fire.
(Crosby Gaige, New York World's Fair Cook Book: The American Kitchen, 1939)
