Cannellini Bean

Sub in whatever you have on hand in Dana Cowin's mix-and-match chili recipe

Don’t toss out your Parmesan rind. Use it to flavor the beans and broth for this comforting classic.

When your beans are tender, take them off the heat and focus on the cooking liquid, doctoring it with good olive oil, salt, and pepper, tasting and seasoning it until the liquid itself is straight-up delicious.

You're going to want to keep making this wholesome vegetarian soup all winter long.

This soup is a terrific choice for those over sixty, as it's abundant in nutrients one especially needs later in life. These include healthy plant protein (older adults are prone to protein insufficiency), fiber, vitamin K, potassium, lysine to aid in calcium absorption, and folate to help reduce homocysteine levels, which are a major risk factor for heart disease. And of course, all soups are soft and so are a favorite for anyone with dental difficulties.

Recipe courtesy of Bon Appetit Executive Chef Mary Nolan

Gigante beans are our favorites, but almost any bean will be delicious this way. Smaller white beans, like cannellini, will cook more quickly.

These aren't sticky-sweet brown sugar baked beans. Think of them like the top crust of a good cassoulet.

Skip expensive store-bought stock: you can extract cleaner, stronger broth from water and a few pantry items you probably already have on hand (think bacon, tomato paste, herbs, peppercorns, a Parm rind, and, of course, kosher salt).

Be sure to start this recipe a day early to allow plenty of time to soak the beans.

If you don’t have time to make a batch of flageolets from scratch, choose the best canned cannellini beans you can find. We're a big fan of Bioitalia beans.

The weeknight, veggie-heavy, nothing-in-the-house-to-eat dinner. Top with a fried egg if you're feeling peckish.

This dish was inspired by pasta e fagiole, the classic Italian pasta and bean stew. Unlike macaroni, the grains stay nice and chewy, even when reheated days later.

Chewy nubbin of farro give special appeal to a hearty Mediterranean vegetable-bean soup that's loaded with calcium-rich kale. If you don't have time to cook the beans from scratch, check out the Express Farro and Chickpea Soup variation.

Thanks to two very hands-off methods for the lamb and polenta, this is an excellent choice for a dinner party.

This pasta salad is a clever take on a well-loved soup. Because it's served at room temperature, it makes a great side dish at a picnic or barbecue. It's colorful and extremely flavorful, with pesto, beans, and vegetables.

This satisfying salad is great alongside broiled fish, roast chicken, or a simple steak. To turn it into a vegetarian meal, fold in sliced hard-boiled eggs.

The pork for this Southern-inspired pasta sauce is studded with garlic, which infuses the meat while it roasts.

Packed with vegetables and white beans, this is the kind of wholesome one-pot meal you need to ward off winter blues.