Alubia Bean Salad With Corn, Tomato, Cotija and Herbs

from the Dining With Friends x Primary Beans collaboration supper club!

I’m a bean girl through and through. In fact my first ever published recipe that I developed was a big ol’ pot of beans. Which also made its way to the OG Bakery Darlene newsletter a few years ago (iykyk). Beans are always stocked in my pantry, dried or canned, and it’s a good week if they’re incorporated into one of my weekly meals. All that to say… when Primary Beans reached out to me, to not only try their beans, but have a full supper club…with beans, in EV-ER-Y course, obviously I said yes.

For the supper club, I chose the varietals from Primary Beans that they source from and are local to Mexico. Which led to a Mexican themed dinner. The final menu was:

• Alubia beans with corn, tomato, cotija, cilantro

• Bayo beans with topped with fried squash blossoms stuffed with oaxacan queso, queso fresco, and roasted poblano pepper. Drizzled with guajillo chili oil.

• Flor de Junio beans in aguachile (recipe for this will be coming at Primary Beans!)

• Ojo de Cabra beans mole baked beans style with charred limey shrimp

• Tres leches with coconut, lime, rum, and passionfruit

The alubia beans with corn tomato, cotija, and cilantro was inspired by elotes and esquites (mexican street corn), but olive oil instead of mayo to feel more like a salad. It’s a recipe I keep coming back to as a weekday lunch, and would be perfect for a picnic or summer BBQ side. It’s also adaptable to whatever herbs or toppings you have on hand. In the “Substitutions” section, I have options for putting a mediterranean spin on it with grilled halloumi, fregola, and vinegar.

I’m also just obsessed with these alubia beans. They are so cute and small, which also makes their cooking time much faster than a regular dried bean. They are nutty, and the insides are so smooth and creamy. I 100% recommend giving them a try.

film photo by alex quetzali

Wines I paired for this menu!

• 2022 Remix Pet Nat- Pouya Soft bubbles, with notes of watermelon, peaches and the slightest refreshing edge of orange peel. Most elegant and juice pet nat!

• 2021 Charelo - Barrigon Fruit-forward with a lot of ripe pineapple, and a note of grapefruit. If you come across any Barrigon— grab it!

• 2022 Amber- Mina Penélope Black tea and stone fruit, stunning skin-contact!

• 2021 Naranja - Octagono Deeply expressive and wild, these wines are the essence of exploration itself. A cult classic and fan fave!

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Now to the recipe!

Serves 4

Can be made a day before.

Whatcha Need!

Tools:

• Cutting board

• Knife

• Medium mixing bowl

• Small bowl to fit inside medium mixing bowl

• Microplane

• Citrus juicer, or just use your hands

• Spoon, or utensil to mix salad

Pantry and Fridge:

• 2 cans of white beans OR 1 cup dried Alubia from Primary Beans, cooked

• Cotija cheese

• Tomatoes, heirloom or cherry

• 1/2 cup fresh cilantro, leaves and stems

• 2 fresh cobs of corn

• 2 limes

• 1/4 cup olive oil

• 2 tsp Ancho chile powder, or more to taste

• Salt

• Pepper

Substitutions:

• White beans or in addition → fregola pasta for a mediterranean version

• Cotija cheese → halloumi cheese for a mediterranean version

• Corn on the cobs → frozen corn, defrosted can also work in a pinch

• Limes → white or red wine vinegar

• Olive oil → mayo for more of an elote style

• Ancho chile powder → cayenne powder, smoked paprika, chipotle powder

Let’s prep!

• If using canned white beans: drain and rinse. If you just cooked fresh/dried beans, just drain from their cooking liquid. Bean broth is still good! and magic! I like to keep it in the freezer and use in place of a regular broth/stock when needed.

• If your cotija is in a block/circle, break it up into smaller pieces, about pea sized, till it makes about 1 cup.

• If using heirloom tomatoes, chop into bite size pieces. If using cherry, I like to cut them in half, but you can also leave them whole or cut into quarters.

• Roughly chop the cilantro.

• Zest and juice both limes.

Let’s get cookin!

• There are different ways you can go about roasting the corn, definitely use your prefered method. I’ll provide my prefered options: On the grill: place the corn in their husks on direct heat and close grill lid. Every 3 minutes or so, rotate the corn until the husks have charred. About 15 minutes in total. Once the husks have charred, carefully shuck the husks and silk from the corn, and return the corn to the grill to continue charring. On a gas stove burner: wrap the corn, in its husk, in foil. place onto a gas stove burner set to medium high. Just like the grill method, rotate the corn every 3 minutes or so, about 15 minutes total. Then remove the corn from the foil, shuck, and place corn back onto burner to char, continuing to rotate every so often. About 5 minutes total.

• Once your corn is cooked, husked, and charred, grab your medium mixing bowl and a small bowl that can fit inside the medium bowl. Place the small bowl upside down (bottom of bowl should be facing you) inside the medium bowl. Place one end of the cob on the inverted, smaller bowl. Then, using a sharp knife, cut downward, as close to the base of the kernels as possible, while making sure not to angle the blade into the cob itself. Rotate the ear of corn, and repeat until all the kernels have been removed. Remove small bowl from the medium bowl.

• To your bowl with the corn, add in the beans, tomatoes, cilantro, lime zest and juice, cotija, ancho pepper, olive oil, and a tbsp of salt and a nice crank of fresh black pepper. Give everything a mix to combine, and taste. Depending on how you cooked your beans, most likely you’ll need to add more salt. Or, by all means, add more cotija (which will provide saltiness) if you want (neeeed) more cheese.

• I like to top mine with more ancho chile powder just for extra smokiness. It’s great served on its own, or with tortilla chips.