Beans, beans, they're good for your heart......

......or they're the musical fruit......

Ha ha. :)

Either way, they're really delicious in this recipe!!

It's Roasted Red Pepper and Cannellini Bean Dip (think hummus, only waaaaaay better.....)

The recipe is an older one that I got from Cooking Light Magazine. I love their recipes!

So, here's what you need:

1/4 cup fresh basil, 1 can of cannellini beans (white kidney beans), 7 oz jar of roasted red bell peppers (or, if you cheat like me, a 12 oz jar of roasted red and yellow bell peppers, because that is what they had at Trader Joe's), 1 clove of garlic, 1 tsp balsamic vinegar, 2 TB olive oil, 1/2 tsp each black pepper (freshly ground if you can, and 1/2 tsp sea salt.

You make this dip in the food processor, so now you have to go drag out your food processor. Ugh. Is yours in some funky, inconvenient place like mine is? I use it somewhat frequently, but it's so cumbersome and bulky that it ends up in the back of the bottom shelf in the pantry, and I have to pull a whole bunch of stuff out to get it. (ok Shari, stop whining now please....)

Attach the chopper blade thingy, not the shredder disc thingy:

So you're going to put the beans (drained and rinsed well...what the heck IS that nasty juice stuff in the can anyhow??), the bell peppers (drained and rinsed), the basil (I just put the whole leaves in), the clove of garlic, and the balsamic vinegar in the bowl of the processor:

Now put the lid on and process it until smooth. It will look something like this-

Then toss in the salt and pepper:

Now put the lid back on, turn the processor on, and while it's running, pour the olive oil down the chute.Since it's hard to measure and pour, I, in the interests of your cooking pleasure, measured how many seconds in took me to pour out 2 TB of olive oil (please, please, hold your applause!) It was 5 seconds. Like, one-one thousand, two-one thousand......

The olive oil makes the dip get all creamy and yummy and delicious! And this stuff is REALLY good for you, especially if you eat it with cucumbers and carrots and cherry tomatoes and sugar snap peas....mmmmmmm....... I also love it on sandwiches instead of mayo, or on salad. Or on ice cream (ok, ok just kidding on the ice cream)

Here's how ridiculous I am- I only put the dip in that bowl to take photos of it, then had to wash the bowl because I put it in tupperware. So lame...hahaha!! It was like a dip photo shoot. I'm not kidding.... LOOK!!

Have a great Friday everyone!! :)