Not understanding....you want to make dumplings out of the beans?

I'm reading it as you have a pot of beans in goop (sauce, juice, whatever) and you want to make dumplings in it. Is that right? Are the beans going to be happy being cooked more enough to make dumplings? At some point, they tend to fall apart.

If you're trying to make bean stew with dumplings but the beans are at the right consistency for beans, but not for cooking dumplings, I'd make the dumplings in a separate pot. If you have plenty of beans, you can whirr up half a cup or more in the food processor or blender and use it to thicken your broth (or you can just use water) and bring some of the bean flavor to the dumplings. You need enough liquid that the dumplings can fit completely under (though they'll bob up). You can boil them on the stove or put them in the oven, then transfer them to your heated beans for five minutes on heat, to marry, or just serve up each into the bowl together. If your beans are too thick, you can add some of the dumpling liquid once the dumplings are cooked and use just enough to get the right consistency.

Barb -

What kind of beans (kidney, black, pinto, navy)? Just plain cooked beans, bean soup, refried beans?

I would suggest you make better use of your freezer, or make a smaller amount of beans. I can "cook" the equivalent of a can of beans in my Thermos bottle, or I can make 2-pounds (or more) and freeze them in user-friendly amounts. I make a large amount of nearly everything I cook, but that doesn't mean I have to eat it for 5-days straight. I intentionally make large batches of most things and freeze it so I can eat it for a month (or more) and not have to cook it but once, and that includes grains, beans, cooked ground beef or turkey, sloppy joes......

I'm not familiar with bean dumplings or dumplings on beans, so I can't help you there.

Do you have a copy of the book "Country Beans" by Rita Bingham? There are all kinds of recipes in that book to transform cooked beans into all kinds of things - from soups to sandwiches, lots of sauces, dips, entrées, but no dumplings, I'm afraid.

-Grainlady

I cooked a rather large amount of beans so that I could freeze some and use the smaller batches. . My Mother did stuff like that. She cooked a Roast on Sunday and made a hash out of the leftovers for Monday because she spent Mondays doing her washing. Me? I might be washing at eleven o'clock at night--whenever I have the time. I cooked my navy beans all night in the slow cooker. My question was because they had been warmed up enough times that there was no broth. Do I just use the no -sodium chicken broth and add the beans and then make the dumplings? My Dad used to make what we called "slicks" which were the heavier dumplings, but I want to make the light fluffy ones. You have to make enough for that meal, they change consistency when held over. Thanks for the help. You must have some library, Grainlady. It keeps me broke trying to get the books you have. I use my freezer a lot, but I have a tendency to lose stuff in it. Barb

Barb, I think you're on the right track. If the bean broth has cooked away, then you'll need to add some sort of liquid (chicken broth, diced tomatoes, etc.) in order to cook dumplings on top of the remaining beans.

Pllog brings up a good point in that with the extra cooking and additional broth, the beans might become quite mushy. But if that doesn't bother you, then go ahead and use your favorite dumpling recipe and cook the combo just as you would chicken & dumplings or stew & dumplings. Just add the dimpling dough as soon as the beans are hot since they're already cooked. Good luck.

Barb, if you lose things in your freezer regularly, it might help to keep a checklist. Write the names of the items you're freezing while you're labelling the packages, along with the sizes. So, say you freeze a 3 pint containers, 1 quart container and two 4 oz. containers of the barbecue beans recipe with the corn in it.

BBQ corn bean 2-9-16.......1q.........3p......2halfc goes on the paper. When you take out a container, put a hash (pen stroke) by the size you took, or cross out the number and write a new one. Keep the page and pen right on or by the freezer. Then you can look at your list and always know what's in there.

agreed @plllog .

You gals put me to shame. I admit I am not that organized. You sound like my daughter, but then I can't find anything after she leaves.---but I love her. Barb

Barb, I certainly didn't mean to shame you! My freezer is a mess! It starts out beautifully organized, but then it's a lot of quickly moving things around to make room for new shapes and sizes without having it all warm up with the door open. Having a list is actually the lazy way for me, but it's easy and effective. It's only easy and effective if it's right there with the pen, where you just have to make a mark and go. I do always label things. I keep the masking tape and sharpie on the counter most of the time so that getting them out doesn't deter me. So it's just a matter of adding new lines to the list when you put things in the freezer.

The really organized people I know have spread sheets. :)

Elery and I now have three freezers, plus two refrigerators and the freezers that are attached to those. When we process beef or pork, I move the old stuff to the top and put the new stuff in the bottom. Two are chest freezers, one is an upright. I hate the upright, there's always something falling out. Every year I make a list of what is in each freezer and try to use the oldest stuff first. "Try" is the operative term, as I still end up with sirloin steak from 2012 or stray packages of venison a couple of years old.

So, Barb, don't feel badly about being disorganized. A friend once came and "organized" my pantry for me. I still haven't found all my stuff and was far more aggravated than I ever was organized. Now I don't care who they are, everyone is prohibited from moving/organizing/touching my stuff! I have my own system and just because some others think there way is better doesn't mean it'll work for me, because my brain just doesn't work that way, LOL. It might not be pretty, but it works for me!

Annie