Red Beans & Rice in July... An Oxymoron?

Not if the grands will eat it! There is no easier meal than getting out your crockpot for beans to cook in it all day. Your house will smell wonderful, too. Thanks to a tip from a cookfriend, I visited the Honey Baked Ham Store earlier this summer while they were having an incredible sale... buy 1 ham bone, get 3 free! My trunk looked like I had frozen body parts in numerous plastic bags. Last week I put rinsed red beans (2#) in the crockpot with an onion, covered with water, then plopped in a ham bone. You will not need to add any salt. The ham bone is seasoned perfectly. If the bone is especially meaty, remove it from the beans after several hours & pull off the meat. Discard bone. Chop cooled ham with Pampered Chef food chopper and make ham salad. Another cookfriend put me onto that delicacy several years ago. Make it just like chicken salad except with ham! Depending on your timetable, you can cook the beans on high for 4-5 hours or low all day. Serve over bed of rice. So delicious. Don't forget to offer the Tabasco Sauce... my dad's favorite.