Southwest Bean & Corn Medley Salad — Colorful and Healthy

“Southwest Bean Medley Salad” is a variation of my favorite “Three Bean Salad’ which I absolutely love when I’m looking for tasty way to serve beans. I was tasked with bringing a savory “vegetable” dish to a large Boy Scout covered dish dinner celebration. I figured that my “southwestern” twists to traditional bean salad would be the perfect dish. (Potato salad and baked beans were taken.) There are plenty of flavor “pops” in the medley from all the added ingredients — bites of onion, red pepper, jalapeño pepper, cilantro — they complement the pinto and black beans. And, I added corn to add to the Mexican theme. The “salad” medley was colorful, flavorful. And, healthy! The ingredients had a sweet/sour vinaigrette dressing with lime juice added — also for the Mexican theme. After the medley was chilled, all the flavors melded together — so I was able to make the dish a day ahead of time to reduce stress. Great to take to an organization buffet meal where smoked brisket and chicken were the main dishes.

Oops, I forgot…. Generation Zero and Generation Alpha don’t really eat many beans. At least these Boy Scouts and their parents didn’t gobble the medley up. So, I had lots of “Southwest Bean & Corn Medley Salad” left over. But never mind that small fact. My husband and I love the dish — we took it home and ate the rest of the very large recipe over the next several days.

Recipe Inspiration

I was motivated to make this salad to take to the Boy Scout celebration since I already had most of the ingredients on hand. And, time was precious this weekend. We seem to have a large surplus of canned beans on hand in my kitchen cabinets due to the fact that my husband cleared out the bean isle of our neighborhood Albertsons on a recent grocery shopping trip. I love “Three Bean Salad” with green beans, wax beans and red (kidney) beans and often will take it to covered dish dinners. Both pinto beans and black beans are fairly mild in flavor and popular, so I reasoned that a “southwest” salad version would work too.

For this vegetable medley, the pinto beans and black beans were the “stars” of the dish:

Ingredients:

I included lots of flavor “pops” in this medley — jalapeño pepper, both green onion and white, sweet onion, red bell pepper, cilantro. Plus corn, in addition to pinto and back beans. Here are all the ingredients:

At the last minute, I decided to add just a bit of sugar to the dressing, making essentially a sweet/sour dressing with a hint of lime. Sugar should be shown in the ingredient photo. The oil and apple cider vinegar are part of the dressing. too.

Making the Salad:

Making the salad is not difficult. Get all the ingredients pre-prepped and then mix them together. Chop up all the vegetables and fresh cilantro. For this medley, I included both a sweet, white onion and green onion. I also included fresh red bell pepper for color and flavor. I also added jalapeño pepper.

Since I was short on time for this Sunday Boy Scout event, I took some shortcuts. Rather than fresh corn, I substituted frozen corn which I cooked in the microwave. I used some of my supply of canned pinto beans and black beans rather than cooking dried beans. Make sure to drain and rinse the beans.

After all the ingredients are ready. mix up the salad. First, combine the drained beans and corn in a very large bowl.

Then, carefully stir in the vegetable/cilantro ingredients.

Make the vinaigrette dressing for this bean and corn salad. I used a “traditional” vinaigrette dressing of vinegar and oil, salt and pepper. For a Mexican flair, I added lime juice. To offset the tart vinegar, I added a little sugar giving a sweet/salad “marinated” effect.

To make the dressing, combine everything except the oil. Then whisk in the oil. If desired, use a small food processor to combine the ingredients and swirl in the oil. The food processor really does a better job of emulsifying all the dressing ingredients. But, again whisking rapidly can work if short on time.

Pour the dressing over the salad and let it chill in the refrigerator for several hours. It is best to transfer to a non-metallic bowl. This salad/side dish can be prepared a day ahead of time. The ingredients will marinate in the dressing and the flavors will blend together. Even better!

When ready to serve, transfer to serving dish and garnish with cherry tomato slices and parsley. And, I added lettuce leaves to line the serving plate.

This makes a refreshing and healthy bean and corn salad for the summertime. Especially great (or maybe not) for a buffet meal! Definitely, good for summer picnics.

So, here’s yet another recipe to use all those canned beans. Enjoy!