How many cans or bags of beans did you buy?

[shunyadragon]

It was not only toilet paper, but panic buying of cans and bags of beans that were cleaned from many shelves. How many cans or bags of beans did you buy?

Source: https://www.npr.org/2020/07/20/892258093/sourdough-is-a-social-media-star-but-those-beans-would-look-great-on-instagram?utm_source=npr_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20200721&utm_term=4690777&utm_campaign=the-new-normal&utm_id=51790990&orgid=

Remember the early days of the pandemic when shoppers were going crazy raiding grocery shelves for flour, yeast and beans? Since then, people have been baking lots and lots of sourdough and banana bread ... but not so much the beans. Now some are complaining on social media about having "bean remorse," and want to know how to put their stockpiles to use. Luckily, Luz Calvo and Catriona Rueda Esquibel, authors of the 2015 cookbook, Decolonize Your Diet: Plant-Based Mexican-American Recipes For Health And Healing, have a few ideas.

Sourdough Is A Social Media Star — But Those Beans Would Look Great On Instagram

Remember the early days of the pandemic when shoppers scoured grocery shelves for flour, yeast and beans? Since then, we've seen ample evidence of people baking sourdough and banana bread on social media ... but what about all those beans?

Bean sales shot up 70% in March, says Tim D. McGreevy, CEO of USA Pulses, a not-for-profit lobbying group representing the dried pea, lentil and chickpea industry. He adds that the trend has diminished but not entirely stopped. In June, orders were still 30% higher than normal.

I went out, I bought pounds of beans and put them proudly on my shelf. ... I had this survival story in my head and now I've got it on my shelf, and I don't think I'll use them until the actual end times.

Kyla Wazana Tompkins

"I went out, I bought pounds of beans and put them proudly on my shelf," says Kyla Wazana Tompkins, a Pomona College professor and former food writer. This, in spite of the fact that Tompkins does not even really like beans. "I went to this primal brain space. I had this survival story in my head and now I've got it on my shelf, and I don't think I'll use them until the actual end times."

Tompkins is hardly alone. An inquiry on this reporter's Facebook page yielded dozens of stories of bean buyers' remorse. That pains Steven Sando, the proprietor of the high-end heirloom bean company, Rancho Gordo. Back in March, Sando found himself bombarded with orders — more than 17,000 of them, he says. As a result, there's a waiting list for 20 different varieties of beans on his website. His staff, he says, is struggling to meet demand for items still in stock, such as flageolet and yellow eye beans.

"The thought of them sitting in a dark pantry makes me ill," he says.


Cookbook authors Catriona Rueda Esquibel and Luz Calvo in their Bay Area backyard.
Miki Vargas/Luz Calvo
They're a way to honor our ancestors. And they make you feel good when you eat them.

Luz Calvo

But no bean goes unwasted in the well-stocked pantry of Luz Calvo and Catriona Rueda Esquibel. The couple estimate they've got at least 15 pounds of beans on hand right now. Their 2015 cookbook, Decolonize Your Diet: Plant-Based Mexican-American Recipes For Health And Healing, draws on family culinary traditions and documents how the two nourished themselves while Calvo was being treated for cancer. Cooking beans, they say, can deepen a connection to community.

"They're a way to honor our ancestors," Calvo says. "And they make you feel good when you eat them."

Still, although beans may be a delicious, meaningful part of foodways from around the world, they do somewhat lack the Instagram charisma of a pillowy loaf of homemade bread. "Maybe there's not the brag factor of sourdough," Calvo concedes. Esquibel adds that while cooking beans is spiritually sustaining, there's little in the way of mastery to show off about. "Like, 'Oh, I conquered a pot of beans,' " she says.

The sheer ease of bean cookery is a plus, as far as Sando of Rancho Gordo is concerned. A movie lover, he has a method for timing them that's perfect for quarantine: Boil your beans for 15, turn them down, then put on the movie All About Eve. When Bette Davis says, "Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy night," that's when you add salt, he says. And when she says "Funny business, a woman's career," start checking them because they're probably done.

But to slightly misquote another classic movie — Casablanca — it doesn't take much to see the problems of us little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Bean consumers, here's looking at you.

© Copyright Original Source

[rogue06]

No beans. No TP.

[Cow Poke]

Mrs CP and I live "out in the country", and have children and grandchildren who count on us.

I can honestly say we didn't do any "panic buying", as we have a well stocked pantry that we have always maintained, including a pretty decent "stock rotation" system, putting the newest stuff "in back", etc...

When I discovered that Sam's Club was selling BULK toilet paper and bleach and stuff, I bought extra to share with members of my family and church members.

It was kind of interesting, because we actually had what we laughingly call a "toilet paper ministry" -- sharing the abundance with our shut-ins and less affluent.

[Maranatha]

No beans. No TP.

Beans, then TP

[Cow Poke]

No beans. No TP.

If you don't have extra of one you won't need extra of the other?

[shunyadragon]

No beans. No TP.

Corn cobs and old Sears Catalogues?

[Leonhard]

For fun I was down to buy a pack of toilet paper when the news hit. I had a bet with a friend that the stores would be filled and he disagreed. So we went down there and they were pretty packed. After that I went home and socially isolated quite a while. In general, at least in the city I was in there wasn't panic buying. People were just stocking up a bit. It calmed down very quickly because the stores just kept restocking, there was never a supply chain issue.

[rogue06]

Corn cobs and old Sears Catalogues?

Don't use that much and had several months worth left from my purchase at the beginning of the year (I typically get a 12 pack).

[mossrose]

No beans, no TP.

I did buy 2 bags of rice near the beginning because they were on sale. But I wouldn't have bought them otherwise.

That is all.

[Cow Poke]

Corn cobs and old Sears Catalogues?

OK, you're about to have this thread moved to the Poop Deck!

[Cow Poke]

Don't use that much and had several months worth left from my purchase at the beginning of the year (I typically get a 12 pack).

You've always been such an optimum pooper.

[shunyadragon]

OK, you're about to have this thread moved to the Poop Deck!

No problem. It was a bit of joke thread anyway.

[Cow Poke]

No problem. It was a bit of joke thread anyway.

And I was joking, Shuny - as far as I'm concerned, it's just fine.

Kinda dialing down the rhetoric a bit.

[DesertBerean]

I'm flush with pinto beans, split peas, navy beans (leftover from my mother's pantry, and some purchases of my own)...and a goodly amount of canned foods. But the TP was a bit of a challenge. And so was some other personal hygiene stuff because I didn't stock up enough.

[Cow Poke]

I'm flush with pinto beans, split peas, navy beans (leftover from my mother's pantry, and some purchases of my own)...and a goodly amount of canned foods. But the TP was a bit of a challenge. And so was some other personal hygiene stuff because I didn't stock up enough.

Are you guys out there familiar with a "pounding"?

It's, apparently, an East Texas tradition where, for example, a church gets a new pastor, and they have a "pounding" for him - bringing all kinds of canned goods, non-perishables, flour, sugar, etc....

Supposedly, it's called a "pounding" because somebody would bring a pound of sugar, somebody else a pound of flour, a pound of Lima beans, a pound....

At the one 'thrown' for me in Tyler, we actually got a can of rattlesnake meat!