Shop Your House First · No. 18 of 20

Beans & Lentils: Pantry Staples That Make Meals Go Further

Canned or dried and what each costs, cooking a pot the easy way, the kidney-bean safety rule, keeping and freezing them, and stretching a pound of meat into dinner for twice as many.

The HearthIQ Kitchen6 min readBuilds on No. 03 · Organize Your PantryCanned or dried · Cook · Keep · Stretch

A bag of dried beans costs about what a can does and makes three or four times as much. Lentils cook in twenty minutes without soaking. And a can of either quietly turns a pound of ground beef into dinner for twice as many people. Here’s how to cook a pot of beans the easy way, the one bean that needs a safety rule, how to keep and freeze them, and how to stretch a meal with them.

Four clear square canisters of flour, rice, oats and black beans on a butcher-block counter, each labeled on masking tape.

From No. 03Organize Your Pantry for VisibilityBeans and lentils keep for a year or more, as long as you can see them.

1 · Canned or driedBoth belong in the pantry.

A bar chart that grows pair by pair: a cup of cooked pinto beans costs 23 cents from dried and 72 cents canned; black beans 26 cents and 78 cents; kidney beans 31 cents and 71 cents, at average U.S. store prices in 2023. — Cooking dried beans costs a third to a half as much per cup.

Canned: the shortcut

Ready right now, and worth every penny on a busy night. Drain them, then give them a rinse in a colander to wash off some of the salt and the thick liquid. Leftovers from an opened can go in a covered container in the fridge for 3 to 4 days.

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Dried: the money-saver

One pound makes about 6 cups cooked, as much as three or four cans. Cook a pot on the weekend and freeze it in can-size portions.

Lentils: the fast one

No soaking, ever. Red lentils cook down soft for soup; green and brown keep more of their shape for salads and tacos. 1 cup dry makes about 2½ cups cooked.

2 · Cook a potSoak, simmer, done.

A large glass bowl of dried pinto beans soaking in water on an oak counter, with a small dish of salt, a measuring spoon and a colander behind it. — Salted soaking water makes the skins tender and the insides creamy.

Step 1: Pick them over and rinse
Spread the beans out and pick out any tiny stones or shriveled beans, then rinse.
Step 2: Soak (the salty way) · 8–24 hr
For each pound, dissolve 3 tablespoons table salt in 4 quarts water and soak the beans 8 to 24 hours. The salt gives you tender skins instead of tough ones. If it’ll be more than a few hours and your kitchen is warm, soak them in the fridge. Drain and rinse.
Step 3: Or quick-soak · 1 hr
Forgot? Cover the beans with water, bring it to a boil for 2 to 3 minutes, then turn off the heat, cover, and let them stand about an hour. Drain and rinse.
Step 4: Simmer · 1–2 hr
Cover with fresh water by a couple of inches, add an onion half or a bay leaf if you like, and simmer gently until creamy all the way through. Soaked black beans take about 1 to 1½ hours; pinto and navy beans 1½ to 2 hours. Taste a few: they’re done when every one is soft. Add tomatoes, vinegar or molasses only once they are; acid keeps beans from softening.

An enameled Dutch oven of simmering black beans in their dark broth with a bay leaf and half an onion, steam rising, a wooden spoon on the rim. — Keep it at a gentle simmer, not a hard boil, so the beans stay whole.

In a pressure cooker, no soaking needed: unsoaked pinto beans take about 15 to 20 minutes at pressure, black beans 20 to 30, chickpeas 15 to 25 and navy beans 25 to 35, plus about 20 minutes to let the pressure come down on its own.

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3 · Keep themIn their liquid, in the fridge or freezer.

Three quart freezer bags of cooked beans in a little of their liquid pressed flat and labeled with masking tape, beside a pint glass jar of cooked chickpeas. — About 1½ cups per bag is one can’s worth.

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Fridge: 3 to 4 days — Cooled quickly and kept covered in some of their cooking liquid.
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Freezer: in their liquid — Freeze about 1½ cups per bag with enough cooking liquid to cover, press flat and label. For the best texture, use them within about a month; frozen, they stay safe longer.
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Dried, in the pantry: 1 to 2 years — Sealed, somewhere cool and dry. Very old beans may never soften, however long you cook them, so use the oldest bag first.
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Cans: years — Unopened canned beans keep for years; skip any can that’s dented, rusty or swollen.

4 · Stretch a mealA little meat, a lot of beans.

A cast-iron skillet of seasoned ground beef stretched with beans beside warm corn tortillas, shredded lettuce, salsa and lime wedges on a wooden board. — Four ounces of beef plus a can of lentils fills 12 tacos.

Beef and lentil tacos for 4. Soften 1 small chopped onion in a tablespoon of oil, about 5 minutes. Stir in 3 minced garlic cloves, 2 tablespoons chili powder, 1 teaspoon each cumin and coriander, ½ teaspoon oregano, ½ teaspoon salt and a pinch of cayenne for a minute. Add just 4 ounces ground beef and cook it 3 to 4 minutes, then 1 can (15 ounces) lentils, rinsed, ½ cup tomato sauce, ½ cup chicken broth, a teaspoon of brown sugar and a teaspoon of cider vinegar. Simmer until thick, about 8 minutes. Fills 12 taco shells; top with cheese, lettuce and tomato.

Tacos

Brown a pound of beef with your usual seasoning, then stir in a can of drained black beans.

Meatloaf

Mix 1 cup cooked lentils into the meat with an extra ½ teaspoon salt; keep the rest of the recipe the same.

Spaghetti sauce

Brown the ground beef or turkey, then add 1 cup cooked lentils.

Chicken soup

Stir in a can of drained chickpeas.

5 · One pot of lentil soupTwelve bowls from two cups of lentils.

A pot of lentil soup with carrots, celery and tomatoes on a stove with steam rising, a ladle in it, and a filled bowl beside a slice of crusty bread. — It freezes beautifully in meal-size containers.

Red lentil soup (12 servings). Rinse 2 cups red lentils and bring them to a boil in 8 cups low-sodium chicken broth. Add 4 diced carrots, cover and cook 30 minutes. Stir in ½ teaspoon each cumin and paprika, 2 low-sodium bouillon cubes and a 10-ounce can of diced tomatoes with green chiles. Meanwhile, soften 1 diced onion and a clove or two of garlic in 2 tablespoons olive oil and add them to the pot, with a cup of leftover chicken if you have it. Simmer 5 minutes, then stir in the juice of a lemon off the heat. Freeze leftovers in meal-size portions, the same way as the batches in No. 05.

Beans and rice are the classic pairing: a pot of black beans and the rice from No. 17 are a week of burrito bowls.

Quick referencePin this.

Sources: FDA, Bad Bug Book, 2nd edition (phytohaemagglutinin in red kidney beans) · USDA Economic Research Service, fruit and vegetable prices (2023) · USDA FSIS, Leftovers and Food Safety, Freezing and Food Safety, and FoodKeeper data · North Dakota State University Extension, bean and lentil publications and the Red Lentil Soup · University of Nebraska–Lincoln Extension, How to Add Legumes to Stretch Your Meals and bean cooking times · Colorado State, Utah State and University of New Hampshire Extension on soaking and storing beans · America’s Test Kitchen on brining beans, Weeknight Ground Beef and Lentil Tacos and lentils, plus reviews of Dutch ovens, multicookers, colanders and can openers. Checked October 4, 2026. HearthIQ may earn a commission on product links.

Next in the series Host From What You OwnA full table for friends, set and served from what’s already in your cupboards.