Rancho Gordo Heirloom Bean Sampler

I'm a true Rancho Gordo Heirloom bean fan. I was looking for a specific variety when I discovered this sampler on Amazon because it included types I hadn't tried before. Their beans are fresh and varieties are really special. Fresh beans take less time to cook (soak for a couple of hours, cook in 3-4 hrs depending on variety). I discovered them about 4 years ago when I ordered "Heirloom Beans" Rancho Gordo cookbook and couldn't find most of the beans in the recipes in local stores. Cooking from recipes in the book using beans from my first sampler was a revelation. They are a constant in our menu now.

These are hands down the best beans you will ever taste. Rancho Gordo has ruined me for other beans. They cook faster, taste creamier and wow have such a rich flavor. Had a friend over for dinner with pasta, bean and veggie dish. She wanted to know what special way I had cooked my beans since they tasted so much better than what she was used to. Just laughed and told her about Rancho Gordo.

I am a bean lover. These are fabulous. If you want to pick your own types of beans instead, they have all the choices at the Ranch Gordo website. They sell for $6 per 1-lb. package, plus shipping. No shipping for orders of $75 or more. Not all beans are available year round. For many of the varieties, they sell an entire crop and then that bean is not available again until it's next season. I can't speak highly enough of the flavor or texture of any of their beans, but my personal favorite is the Cranberry bean. Delicious.

I bought these rather expensive beans because I'd read incredible reviews, even a good magazine article lauding Rancho Gordon. I expected them to be much more flavorful than other dried beans. I've now tried 3 of the 5 varieties, and my husband and I haven't been able to tell these apart from supermarket beans. On the plus side, these cook more quickly than other beans, they have a nice texture, and they're actually pretty. The flavor is fine, but it's not extraordinary.

We are in the third week of the Great Bean Experiment, and loving it.We have tried Good Mother Stallard, Rio Zape, and Goats' Eye. Upcoming are from our sampler are Brown Tepary, Cranberry Bean, Santa Maria Pinquintos, Cassoulet Bean, and Christmas Lima.I suspect I'm unclear on the concept of the Mirapoix mentioned on the package, but we are pleased with the outcome. I start a soak circa 11am. I then spend an hour each Saturday afternoon chopping 2 stalks of celery, three carrots, two yellow onions and 1/2 head of garlic, sautéed in that order. I drain and rise the beans and then rolling boil them for 5 minutes, keeping this water. The soak and the boil get rid of unwanted oligosaccharides (indigestible gassy sugars) and lectins respectively. I then toss in the mirapoix and a 3 in strip of kombu (seaweed) to further diminish the oligosaccharides, while adding back minerals lost through soaking. I've discarded the kombu after beans are cooked, though I hear many eat it.We eat these beans just with the tasty "pot liquor" that formed. Amazingly yummy. For the next night, we've added a can of fire roasted tomatoes and the next day gelatin from a roasted chicken and a bit of the chicken. Zowie! We've also extended it with brown rice. I hope to try some actual recipes at some point. So far we are just winging it. There are just two of us and the beans become three nights worth of meals.We have also kept out some of the (uncooked) beans to grow this spring, which should be a further adventure. Stay tuned.The beans just taste like beans, just like snozberries taste like snozberries, and yet the flavor is intense, satisfying and just plain yummy. Each type has had a different flavor and texture. It will undoubtably take me several pleasurable years of bean laden experience to be able to explain why these are so different from every bean I previously ate.I suggest trying them out. I am sure glad I did.

So eager to cook my first batch of beans, I didn't even wait til I had celery and my favorite, some nice smoked bacon. I winged it with dry spices (smoked paprika rocks), a couple tomatoes and an onion. Halfway through cooking I had to turn off the heat, cover the pot and leave for several hours. In spite of these setbacks, I still made the tastiest pot of black beans ever! If you've limped along for years with ancient supermarket dried beans, Rancho Gordo beans will be a revelation. Worth every penny!!

I gave these to my husband along with the Rancho Gordo cookbook. We made the Pasta Fazool, and it was amazing! We loosely followed the recipe and did things backward, but it tasted great and the beans were amazing. My husband has made a lot of beans in his days, but he was blown away by the size of the beans the next morning after soaking all night. When we made the soup, they reduced in size, but these fresh beans make all the difference. I highly recommend to even the casual bean eater. May as well make it the best!

Beautiful, quality heirloom beans, packaged well in a sturdy box (all beans intact)!. The box included recipe cards, ideas and references. I was so impressed, I joined their bean club. A whole new world opened up for us when we discovered Rancho Gordo heirloom beans. We are enjoying protein-filled delicious meals without all the rigmarole that goes with meat. A definite winner.