Below, I describe the recipe at a high level. You may wonder, "In what ratios should we add various ingredients?" I leave that to you. Please experiment and optimize the taste for yourself! :-)

(1) Beans: I soak some beans overnight. After 12-18 hrs, I rinse the beans and boil them.

• How to clean, soak, rinse and cook? Bean Institute has good guidelines: The Traditional Four-Step Method.
• What pot do I use? Something simple like this steamer suffices. Some people prefer Instant Pot — I've used Instant Pot a few times but prefer a simple pot for cooking.
• Choice of beans? Luckily, we have so many around! I'm happy to boil any beans I can find in the market: lentils, garbanzo, black gram, soybeans, black eye beans, red beans, black beans, white beans, pinto beans, … They all turn out well!

(2) Greens: Invariably, I use kale or collards. Sometimes, I add chopped radicchio or chopped kohlrabi leaves.

• How to cook greens? I use one of these techniques:
  1. When beans are well boiled and almost done, I add freshly chopped greens to them and close the lid. Within a few mins (2-5 minutes), greens are cooked!
  2. Steam the greens for 4-5 minutes in the top portion of the steamer. In the end, mix them with boiled beans and all other ingredients.
• I like greens to be a little chewy so that I get to use my teeth for mastication.
• What greens do I strive to include? In his Optimum Nutrition Guidelines, Dr Greger explains: "low-oxalate dark leafy greens which includes all greens except spinach, chard and beet greens". Kale and collards qualify and go well with this recipe.

(3) Spices: I always add ginger, garlic, onion / leeks, turmeric root & black pepper. This is a typical medley of spices in North Indian cuisine. In addition, I often add a few other random spices in small amounts to the mix — whatever I have at home — sumac, tulsi powder, nutmeg, cinnamon, dried mango, and so on. All of these introduce random flavors but they all taste just fine to me.

Typically, I don't cook these spices for too long; I add them towards the very end, when I'm mixing beans and greens together.

(4) Herbs: Fresh if possible; dried otherwise: whatever I have at home: {dill, parsley, mint, oregano, thyme, rosemary, cilantro, …}.

I don't cook herbs for too long; I add them towards the very end, when I'm mixing greens and beans together.

(5) Tomatoes & Lemon: Always! Both are added in generous amounts, to taste. I often add lemon pulp as well after mincing it.

(6) Pineapple (optional): If added, this imparts a wonderful flavor to the overall preparation. I don't always have pineapple at home. When I do, I use it for this recipe.

(7) Seeds: A few pumpkin seeds or sunflower seeds in the end; neither of these seeds needs any cooking; we can eat them raw; we may soak them overnight to soften them. I often add misc seeds like cumin, black cumin, caraway seeds, … also. Such seeds need boiling, so I introduce add them to beans while they are boiling.

(8) Berries (optional): I invested in several dried berries like white mulberries, golden berries, goji berries, bilberries, barberries and cranberries . Usually, I introduce these berried after soaking into the Roasted Veggie Medley recipe; sometimes, I introduce them to the 'Greens n Beans' recipe too for flavor. Generally speaking, these berries don't need any cooking (except some berries like elderberries), so I add them in the very end to the final preparation.

The spice sumac is also a berry — dried sumac berries. I encourage my friends to buy sumac — it is said to be very high in antioxidants, it tastes good and it imparts a red color to preparations, which is appealing to the human eye.

(8) Soy (optional): Sometimes, I throw in some chopped tofu in the end. Firm tofu doesn't need further cooking, so I add it in the very end to the final preparation.

(9) Mushroom powder (optional): Sometimes, I add some mushroom powder like this one; it has 10 mushrooms! Yay! :-)

(10) Mix n Enjoy!: In the end, I mix everything together and serve it! :-)

Notes:

1. Remember Dr Fuhrman's G-BOMBS? Greens, Beans, Onion, Mushrooms, Berries, Seeds. This recipe has all of these!
2. Soupy? With extra water, this flavorful recipe becomes soupy.
3. What about salt? I don't use any table salt, rock salt, Himalayan salt or Celtic salt. The final preparation is WFPB-SOS, where WFPB means Whole Food Plant-Based, and SOS means salt-free, oil-free, sugar-free. We get rich flavors from beans, greens, lemon (in abundance, to taste) and various spices added to this recipe!

Summary: The two main ingredients are Beans and Greens, both of which are important food components that we should eat daily. The rest of the components are to enhance the flavor and to flood our bodies with health-promoting micronutrients like antioxidants, anti-inflammatories, and so on. Tastewise, the final preparation is lemony & yum!