Jill Murray

Hold the phone! We are not done with this bean, people.

I had just one cup of black beans left over, and had resigned myself to tossing them on something last-minute. (Yes, probably rice. Don’t judge.)

Then, I signed up for this neato-cool-totally-free nutrition and fitness tracker thing: SparkPeople.com. They’re marketing it as a weight-loss tool, but you can use it for just about anything from gaining weight, to increasing fitness levels, building strength or just de-stressing.

The SparkPeople have have a decent list of recipes, and I was thusly inspired to make baked sweet potatoes, stuffed with black beans and fake cheese (I made the Buffalo Mostarella from the Uncheese Cookbook.) and a side of rice.

Do you know how awesome sweet potatoes and yams are? THIS AWESOME, that’s how awesome. When I was growing up, we only ate them once a year, at Thanksgiving, and always with two different kinds of sugar. But they are just as good without sugar, and without sugar you can eat them all the time. They are filling and tasty. Their protein value is right off the chart, and they’re full of fibre and vitamins and everything that is good in the world.

In fact, if you were stranded on a desert island and forced to choose a desert-island list, not of records but of food to bring with you (you can’t eat records, yo), you should probably choose most of what’s in this recipe: Sweet potato, black beans, and brown rice.

Here’s all you gotta do:

1. Get some nice, big sweet potatoes and give ‘em a good scrub ’cause you’re going to cook ‘em and eat ‘em with the skin on.
2. Pierce potatoes with a fork and cook in a 400F oven for approximately 45 minutes– until potatoes are nice and tender on the inside, but not so squishy that they’re falling apart completely.
3. Heat the black beans– about half a cup per person. Use a saucepan or the mircrowave, if you’re lazy and not afraid of the microwave.
4. Once fully cooked, slice each potato length-wise and top with 1/2 cup black beans and 1/2 oz uncheese.
5. Serve with a side of brown rice. I like to squeeze a bit of lemon over my rice, then salt and pepper it. Lemon goes great beside sweet pototatoes.