Cranberry Beans, Sausage, and Kale

It was such a pleasure when I spotted these beautiful pink and white speckled beans at the local Amish market...and if you know me I just had to pick some up. While I have used fresh black eyed peas on New Year's Day, they were packaged in a shrink wrapped container and were pretty much ready to use. They are also called Shelly beans, and I did have to shell them myself, but I got a small amount so it was kinda fun to do. Easy enough to figure how to use these pretty beans as well. Just gently boil them until soft around 20-30 minutes.

I decided to try them while my husband was out of state driving his father home to Michigan, my daughter and I could make a meal of it. We were at Whole Foods and picked up some fresh Cuban sausage. I cooked the sausage with the beans first, then sauteed in a skillet.

With a little bit of my garlic Parmesan olive oil I cooked some shallots and garlic. (I didn't have any onions) add the sausage and brown it the way you like it.

Add the beans and some of the liquid used to cook the beans. You can also use any firm white bean if you can't find cranberry beans, like cannellini beans. I also added some fresh sage from my garden sliced or chopped finely.

Some organic kale we also picked up from Whole Foods was on sale. Wash it and tear it off from the tough ribs. You can probably add the kale and cook it down a bit before adding the cooked beans, but if you cooked the beans slightly under add the beans at the same time with the cooking liquid..and it will steam the kale nicely.


Sprinkle with some sea salt and fresh ground pepper. Top with some fresh grated cheese like Parmesan, I used asiago because that is what I had in hand. It didn't get in the photo though....

Served with rice because that is what my daughter wanted and it was a good meal for the both of us. This is definitely a meal you can make a little or a lot of. If you like it a little spicy you can add some red pepper flakes or use spicy sausage. I will make this again for sure...


...and next time I won't be in such a hurry to snap the photo...promise!

Hopefully this will be the last of the busy season on the beach until December when they all come back...it was even this busy at sunset at the beach that we can usually always find a place to park.

so we just walk out to the water and mosey on up the beach...

...until the crowd thins out and we see this...we did get asked to take a picture of some tourists from Maine visiting for Spring Break, they had the whole family here and they couldnt get over seeing the sun set over the water...they get the sunrise!


Enjoy your weekend...next I'll bring dessert!