This foolproof recipe yields perfectly tender and delicious black beans. Make a pot and enjoy black beans all week! No need to soak the beans before using. Recipe yields 6 cups beans (the equivalent of 4 cans); you can freeze leftovers or cut the recipe in half.
Recipe by Cookie and Kate on July 22, 2020
Prep time: PT15M
Cook time: PT1H10M
Total time: PT1H25M
Rating
4.9 stars ( reviews)
Keywords
pantry friendly, healthy
Ingredients
1 pound (16 ounces or scant 2 ½ cups) dried black beans*
1 medium red onion, chopped
4 medium cloves garlic, peeled but left whole
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cumin
One strip of orange zest, about 2 inches long by ½ inch wide
½ teaspoon red pepper flakes (omit or reduce if sensitive to spice)
8 cups water**, more if needed
2 tablespoons finely chopped cilantro, optional
1 tablespoon lime juice
Categories
Side dish
Cuisine
Mexican
Steps
First, pick through your black beans for debris (sometimes tiny rocks can sneak in). Place the beans in a fine mesh colander or sieve and rinse very well. Pour the beans into a large Dutch oven or saucepan (4 quarts or larger in capacity).
Add the onion, garlic, bay leaves, olive oil, salt, cumin, orange zest and red pepper flakes (if using) to the pot. Pour in the water.
Cover the pot and bring it to a boil over high heat. Remove the lid and reduce the heat to low to maintain a gentle simmer. Give the beans a stir to make sure none are stuck to the bottom of the pot, and set a timer for 1 hour. Leave the pot uncovered and adjust the heat as necessary to maintain a gentle simmer (you should see several small bubbles popping to the surface at any given moment).
Once the timer goes off, test a couple of beans by using a fork to press them against the side of the pot. If they’re easy to press through, taste a few (carefully! they’re hot!) to see if they’re sufficiently plump, tender and delicious.
Otherwise, continue cooking, testing in 15 to 30 minute intervals as needed, until they’re done. If you’re running low on liquid, add water in 1-cup increments so the beans are covered at all time. (As mentioned in the post, if your beans are old, they can take several hours to cook and require a lot more water, and some very old beans may never cook through.)
Once the beans are very tender and tasty, you can increase the heat a little to reduce the cooking liquid into a more gravy-like consistency, about 5 to 15 minutes (it will continue to thicken up as the beans cool).
Remove the pot from the heat. Carefully remove the orange zest and both bay leaves. Use a fork to press the garlic against the side of the bowl to break it up. Add the cilantro, if using, and lime juice. Stir to combine. Season to taste with additional salt, if needed. Use as desired.
Allow leftover beans to cool to room temperature before storing in the refrigerator, covered, for up to 4 to 5 days. You can also freeze leftover beans for several months.***
Nutitrion
Serving Size: 1 cup beans
Calories: 291 calories
Carbohydrates: 50 g
Protein: 16.8 g
Fat: 3.5 g
Saturated Fat: 0.6 g
Trans Fat: 0 g
Cholesterol: 0 mg
Sodium: 359 mg
Sugar: 2.5 g
Reviews
Ari Hansen on 2024-07-26 (5 stars): Love this thank you!!
Erica on 2024-07-30 (5 stars): These are excellent. Literally everytime I've used dry beans they never cook and are hard as rocks after hours. Now I understand that I was using really old beans.
Today, I made this for a big party and they are tasty and cooked in about an hour. Will definitely use this recipe again. Thank you.
Jodi Betz on 2024-11-13 (5 stars): I made these beans a couple of times now, and the only thing I did differently was I used homemade vegetable stock, instead of water and omitted the onion and garlic since it was in the stock. The game changer for me is the olive oil and orange peel. My husband commented that he will never buy cans of black beans again after tasting this recipe. Thank you for the recipe.
CAROL on 2024-08-16 (5 stars): I'm one of the laziest people on the face of the earth but I decided I wanted to make these black beans from scratch. I will never, ever eat a canned black bean again! When you said they would be worth it, you weren't kidding! I will be having the black bean burrito bowl tonight for dinner and I can't wait to eat it. I just need to stop myself from sneaking spoonfuls of black beans from the bowl while I wait for my rice to cook!
Chip on 2024-08-29 (5 stars): Great ingredients, wonderful aroma and flavor! The only problem I had--as my first time buying and making beans from scratch--was that the black beans I got were the largest I've ever seen! So after cooking for two hours, they still weren't completely soft. I'm going to guess these particular beans would have taken four hours, but then a lot of your wonderful stuff would have cooked out. I suppose I could have cooked them without the ingredients for three hours, and then edded them in for the last hour, but I think I'll just try again with much smaller beans LOL!
amy on 2024-09-29 (5 stars): I thought I knew how to cook black beans. Apparently, not. These are the best I have ever had! Thank you!
Christina on 2024-10-09 (5 stars): These are fantastic and have become a regular staple in our home. Thank you so much for sharing a wonderful recipe!
EJ Clark on 2025-01-08 (5 stars): These are fantastic! Thanks for the recipe
Scott on 2025-02-13 (5 stars): Thanks for the deliciousness!
jaci on 2025-03-02 (5 stars): This recipe is very good! The only thing I can add it I used it with some beans I had left over from the pandemic, they were grown in the NW. I just added a small amount of baking soda and they were super tender. Just in case you are on a budget like me!
Pho on 2025-03-06 (5 stars): I used this recipe for black-eyed peas and was fantastic. I keep grated organic orange zest in feezer so used some of that & threw in 4-5 cardamom pods (discarded after cooked). I read on another blog about the use of baking soda for beans that are old - may be worth your cooks to research that if using older beans.
Kathy on 2025-03-31 (5 stars): I had never made black beans from scratch before, and am now using the recipe for the second time. I appreciate you explaining why to put the spices in the recipe. My cooking style is to open 2 or 3 recipes and take what I think is important from all of them and then cook a combination of the recipes. Your recipe is a combination of many others you see online so it makes things so simple. The orange peel is such a subtle game changer and adds so much dimension. These end up tasting much better than canned beans. Thank you for sharing this.
Sylvie on 2025-04-11 (5 stars): Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I have been on the hunt for a good from scratch black bean recipes for what seems like decades - only to be disappointed time after time. This recipe hits it out of the park and will be in heavy rotation in my home. I also very much appreciate your detailed descriptions of the impact of water, bean age, salt, etc. on the final outcome. I always appreciate the opportunity to learn as I cook!
Debbie Richard on 2025-04-15 (5 stars): Just perfect!!! I was surprised that they didn’t need a pre-soak. Perfectly creamy with a nice hint of spice. I like to have a bit of beans everyday so this will be a staple in my fridge from now on. Way better and cheaper than canned beans.
Tiffany on 2025-05-08 (5 stars): I made these tonight for dinner and followed the recipe exactly as written. They were DELICIOUS!!!!!!! I could eat them every night! Now I will share this recipe with all my friends. Thank you!
Lauren on 2025-06-14 (2 stars): Bro, this recipe doesn’t say when to add the beans. I obviously realize now that I should have added them with the garlic and onion. Buuut following the instructions I added the water, went to next step—
Sonja Holzl on 2025-07-09 (5 stars): Absolutely delicious and so simple!
Janice on 2025-07-27 (5 stars): Delicious
Allyson on 2025-07-29 (5 stars): Loved the beans! I just made them with just salt and onion, taking out the onion before serving, but my kids gobbled them up in tacos. Canned beans can be so salty, so this is a nice alternative.
notbob on 2025-08-02 (2 stars): a lot of useless info that should have been put in a separate article. have to scroll past the small book worth of redundant info just to gander at a basic recipe. after trying the recipe it lacks a lot in flavor. measurements were off and need adjustment. i'll probably never use this site for recipes again if i constantly have to filter past the useless rant just to find the recipe and then have to adjust recipe rendering the point of this page/site to practically useless. the positive, once you actually get to the recipe its a good place to start if you are new to black beans or any bean from dry not canned.
DebC on 2025-09-15 (5 stars): I have always preferred to cook my own black beans from dried ones rather than use canned and needed to make some for inclusion in another recipe. These were by far the most flavorful black beans I've ever made and the texture was perfect (although I did soak them before cooking)! Glad I made extra so I could have some to eat on their own, too!
Sue Collare on 2025-10-28 (5 stars): I have grown black beans for a few years and harvested them and put in jars, but never knew how to cook them. I enjoy growing plants just to grow. I found your recipe and they turned out great! Even though they were old, they did not take more than 2 hours to cook. I have a few jars of dried beans from the garden and now I know how to cook them. These will be so good in many recipes. Thanks for the great ideas!
