This is how I had/am having legumes today:

For lunch, chickpea salad mixed with a lemon-caper-tahini dressing that I ate with Ryvita and raw veggies.

Tonight I am having leftover red lentil soup, pita and salad. I cooked the soup using whatever I had on hand: carrot, fennel, tomato, celery, onion, garlic and spices. So simple and very tasty.

I’ve been meaning to try your oven-baked lentils recipe and plan on making them on Friday!

My favourite way to eat legumes at the moment:

Black bean and sweet potato burrito. Yum!
Hummus on 9 grain vitaweets
Lentil vegetable sausage soup
Morrocan chickpea fish stew
Tinned baked beans with an egg heated up in the microwave with chilli

There is also a great Malaysian snack – Kacang Puteh. Spiced chickpeas that they used to serve in paper cones. Yum.

You read my mind Kathyrn! I’m making a frittata for lunch to clean out the pantry and use up some leftover vegies. It’s going to have chickpeas, pumpkin, herbs, cherry tomatoes, spinach and halloumi! Phew. :)

Mung bean sprouts it shall be. Started sprouting last week and they are really, really yummy today.

Just what I feel like.

Ha – I managed to fulfill this task before even reading your post!

I was out of milk this morning, so I treated myself to house-made baked beans on toast from a nearby cafe. Not only delicious but they have been keeping me satisfied for hours!

You’ve got some great recipe suggestions there. Three more from me:
– throw a can of rinsed beans into any soup – keep ‘em chunky or blend them down for a creamy consistency;
– roughly mash chickpeas and make mock tuna salad sandwiches;
– this recipe for Indian spiced chickpeas is saucy, tangy and just downright fab.

i really don’t have any issues with eating legumes, in fact they are one of my favourite foods and i eat them almost every day.
this morning i had hummous and cucumber on toast and my lunch includes some salad which has red kidney beans in it, and more hummous. i think legumes are the perfect food as they are so nutritious, easy, adaptable and cheap!

i bought some black beans for the first time this week and i look forward to using them soon! also bought some pre-made falafel which will be a quick and easy weekend meal i think.

oh and Christie – that frittata sounds delicious!

I love making the chickpea salad that i read about on orangette – great blog! (http://orangette.blogspot.com/2007/01/brown-bag-it.html). It is just chickpeas, lemon juice, olive oil, parmesan cheese, and a pinch of salt. I also usually put some pepper in. It is divine – yum!
Though I must admit, I probably do not eat enough legumes. I try to add them to meals though to make sure I eat some. Kidney beans in spag bol and taco mix, chickpeas in curry, lentils or soup mix in soup. I will try harder!

Tonight is date night and we’ll almost certainly be having Italian with a side salad of course!! So I’m fitting my legumes in at lunch time, with the lentil, sesame and sunflower burgers from Charmaine Solomon’s Complete Vegetarian Cookbook.

i loooove legumes. I think I eat too many of them though. Can you eat too many? I tend to pay for it a little if you know what i mean

I am having leftover split pea and barley soup tonight – have wanted to use up my split peas before the end of winter and just made it.

I am not sure if you have said elsewhere Kathryn but I have found that not all legumes are equal – I have found some brands of tinned chickpeas and kidney beans etc are really not cooked well and also that when buying them dried that they are often fresher when loose at a market than in a packet at the supermarket – don’t know if others have had this experience but it does pay to be a bit canny when shopping for legumes

Oh and I think this post qualifies for my favourite new expression – leguminous evangelist :-)

Change in my plans. Didn’t properly read the burger instructions before deciding on making them. Specifically didn’t read the “leave to soak for 2 hours” instruction.

So lunch turned into my latest something new – kohlrabi in Helen Graves fennel coleslaw. Teamed this with baked ricotta. Shall make the burgers over the weekend.

I ate chickpeas on Tuesday night but managed to accidentally open a can of fava beans instead, which I’d got with an intention of trying them when I find an inspiring recipe. I put them in a box in the fridge because I really did need chickpeas. I think they’re the same thing as canned broad beans. Can anyone tell me something good to do with them before they go off?

The only problem/issue I have with legumes is that i am very much a raw foodie wannabe, and the beans have to be cooked.

I’ve seen raw fava beans, and edemame – how do their protein content compare with dried versions?

Hey Gwyneth, you could try making falafel with your fava beans. I know they’re typically made with chickpeas, but the fellow at a local cafe with lovely falafel proudly cites their use of fava beans as what sets ‘em apart from the rest.

... actually I just too a look at the recipe that Kathryn linked to and it suggests fava beans as an alternative anyway!

I would like to try the chickpea recipe that Bel linked to. It mentions using the best brand of tin chickpeas available, but it’s an American site. Anyone have an opinion on what are the best ones here (in Australia) for using in salads???

Shorty: edamames are about 10 percent protein, which compares very favourably to cooked chickpeas, lentils etc which tend to be between 6 and 10 percent. You could also try sprouting dried beans – which means you can eat them raw and still get plenty of nutrition.

Hi Kathryn – is there any nutritional difference between dried and tinned legumes?

My favourite new legume is the black bean which Harris Farm have started selling. They are so tasty :)

Amanda, I usually use the Edgells chickpeas. I find that the cheaper brands don’t taste as nice. I’m sure other people have suggestions as well but that is what I normally use and the salad is SO yummy! I sometimes make up a double batch to keep in the fridge in a container for a couple of days and scoop them out as I need them for a snack or to take to work and I also add them to garden salads for a bit of extra flavour.

Cindy… thanks… but that falafel recipe says specifically not to use canned chickpeas, I suspect the same applies to canned favas. I’m just going to have to eat a couple as is, to see what they’re like, and then wing it. I’m thinking either some kind of salad (I have some watercress that might go well…) or a kind of cheat’s baked beans on toast, with tomato paste and worcestershire sauce.

I’ll happily eat any chickpea, but I often get the Siena ones and they’re quite good.

Fiona – black beans? I love them, will have to keep my eyes open next time I go to Harris Farm. There’s little difference nutritionally between tinned and dried beans (which have been soaked and cooked). Some tins have salt added – which does of course bump up the sodium content.

I’ve always thought this recipe using tinned fava beans looks pretty good.