On various occassions, some people have asked me about the recipe for my bean dip. I have generally answered, "There is no recipe. I throw a bunch of stuff together in a kettle, and keep adding until the proportions taste right." However, I have gradually settled on a general formula, which I use when buying ingredients. I shall presently share that here.

Initially, when I first started making it, I mixed together a lot of pre-fab stuff. Refried beans out of a can, mixed with salsa out of a jar, and cheese added as a tasty afterthought. I would sometimes sprinkle liberal amounts of garlic powder and onion salt to enhance the flavor. That's easiest, but not nearly as fun and satisfying as mixing raw ingredients together from scratch (not to mention cost effectiveness).

So, after much trial, error, experimentation, and variations, here's what I typically do these days. As always, it continues to evolve. (Actually, the amounts I'm specifying here are cut in half. I like to make a big kettle full, but I assume most people would probably not want as much. If you like to make massive quantities like I do, then double all these numbers, and be sure to use a large pot.)

Ingredients:

• 1 lb. raw pinto beans.
• 1.5 cloves bulk garlic, from the produce section.
• 1 nice big onion.
• 3 jalapeño peppers.
• 1.5 habanero peppers. (You might have to shop around for these; I've only been able to find them at a King Soopers store which luckily happens to be near here. Or optionally, if you're really squeamish like my mom, these can be omitted.)
• One 13.5 oz can of crushed tomatios. Even better are the crushed tomatos with green chiles mixed in. (Yes, I know this violates the "all fresh ingredients" mantra. Maybe one of these days, I'll try using raw tomatos and/or chilis, but I'm lazy, and the canned ones work great.)
• A 1 pound block of colby jack cheese. (Optionally, sharp chedder can be substituted if it's cheaper or you like that flavor better.)
• A bunch of tortilla chips. (Not an official part of the bean dip recipe, but it wouldn't be much good without chips to dip with.)
• Random little stuff, which you probably already have in the kitches: Salt, black pepper, water.

(The "1.5" fractional parts above were the result of me dividing things in half. Feel free to round them up or down, depending on your mood.)

Rinse the pinto beans off, and put them in a kettle. The official instructions on the bag usually say you're supposed to soak them overnight, but I've gotten away with just cooking them straight up if I'm in a hurry.

Put a bunch of water in the kettle with the beans. The water should occupy 3 to 5 times the volume the beans occupy. (I don't generally measure this exactly, but I probably should. Last time, I got in trouble because I had too much water and had to boil a bunch of it off at the end.)

Cook on low to medium heat for several hours. When it starts to get warm, dump a bunch of salt into the water. (Again, I don't measure, but I probably should, especially if I'm going to post this as a recipe. A wild guess would be around a tablespoon. Hah.)

While the beans are cooking, peel the garlic and chop it into tiny little pieces. The smaller the better. Dump them into the kettle while the beans are cooking. Do the same with the onion, jalapeño peppers, and habaneros.

(It's best if you put these in when the beans are about half done, because the flavor can be absorbed into the beans as they cook. It also softens up the onion, garlic, and pepper bits nicely.)

When the beans get close to done, dump in the can of tomatoes (with optional green chiles).

Throw in some ground black pepper, and perhaps add more salt. Sample small spoonfuls frequently and fine tune it.

When the beans have cooked long enough to get really soft, mash them into a paste. (If you happen to have an electric mixer like my mom does, that makes it really easy.) If it ends up really runny, as happened to me last time, boil it down until it reaches a nice dip-able consistency. It's ok if it's a little runny at this stage, because we're still not done quite yet....

The final step: Cut the cheese into little cubes, and dump them in. Mix it around, and keep the heat on while the cheese melts. Stir it around until all the cheese has dissolved into the mixture.

Turn the stove off, and dip some onto a chip. Ideally, the bean dip will gradually solidify on the chip as it cools. Insert in mouth and smile.

(Note on spicy hot-ness: The propotions specified here produced a product which my brother and I found rather mild; my mom found it hot, but more edible than some of my past creations (she mixed some sour cream into hers and generally liked it after that); my dad thought it was just right. If I were making it just for myself, I would use more jalapenos, and possibly an extra habanero or two. My mom, being the extreme spice-a-phobe, would probably use half a jalapeno, if that. Experiment to see what fits your palette.)