As a diabetic, I’m always looking for ways to control my glucose levels. Recent studies have show that eating a cup of beans per day can reduce glucose levels and make control easier. So I tried it myself: for a month I ate a cup of beans per day. One of my favorites was Paisley Farm All Natural Five Bean Salad – 64oz for a pittance at Sam’s Club. Sure enough, my glucose levels fell. But, I felt I needed more variety. I was listing to NPR and Tom Ashbrook’s fine program “On Point” on Thanksgiving and Crescent Dragonwagon was talking about her new bean cookbook. I listened to the interview and immediately got a copy of Bean by Bean. I’m working my way through it. Delicious recipes! You don’t have to be a diabetic to love this food. GRADE: A
BEAN FACTS:
1. Beans are the only cultivated plants that actually enrich, rather than deplete, the soil during the growing process. How is this possible? Legumes have nodules on their roots that add nitrogen to the soil instead of using it up.
2. Cooked beans can be frozen for up to six months. Thaw them overnight in the fridge before reheating.
3. Bean carbohydrates have been proven to drastically improve the stability of blood sugar levels in diabetics. Many adult-onset diabetics have been able to greatly reduce or eliminate their dependence on insulin through diets containing substantial amounts of beans.
4. In ancient Rome, so esteemed were legumes that the four leading families took their names from them: Lentullus (lentil), Piso (pea), Cicero (chickpea), and Fabius (fava).
5. Some ancient cults who believed in reincarnation, most notably the monastic followers of Pythagoras, thought human souls traveled through the stems of bean plants to Hades, where they were then transmogrified for their next lives; it was therefore a sin to eat beans or even walk among bean plants.
6. The mischief-maker behind the bean’s reputation as a musical fruit is a group of complex sugars called oligosaccharides. Oligosaccharides cannot be broken down by our digestive enzymes; instead, our intestinal bacteria ferment them during digestion, causing most of the gas attributable to beans. Luckily, it’s possible to mitigate the gas-making effects of beans through controlling factors such as cooking method and duration, complementary ingredients, and the variety of bean used. (The least “flatulating” legumes are said to be lentils, split peas, adzuki beans, mung beans, and black-eyed peas.)
7. In terms of sheer numbers and staggering diversity, no part of the world comes close to matching the abundance and variety of beans available in America: kidney and black beans, navy and cranberry, lima, white runner, scarlet runner, brown tepary and white tepary, calico, eye-of-the-goat, nightfall, fresh green beans, and more!
BEAN BY BEAN: A COOKBOOK By Crescent Dragonwagon
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Many of you will recognize Russell Kirk as the author of Old House of Fear (1961), The Surly Sullen Bell (1962), A Creature of the Twilight: His Memorials (1966), The Princess of All Lands (1979), Lord of the Hollow Dark (1979), Watchers at the Strait Gate (1984), Off the Sand Road: Ghost Stories, Volume One (2002), What Shadows We Pursue: Ghost Stories, Volume Two (2003) and Ancestral Shadows: An Anthology of Ghostly Tales (2004). But Russell Kirk was also a major figure in the conservative movement. No, this is not a Tea Party nutcase. Kirk believed in the power of ideas. He was an expert on Edmund Burke’s philosophies. I found Enemies of Permanent Things a bit dated (it was published in 1969) but stimulating in its defense of considering the implications of change before we make them. In a section of “Norms of Literature,” Kirk provides a masterful analysis of the work of Ray Bradbury. If you’re interested in ideas, Enemies of Permanent Things will make you think. GRADE: A-
Storage Wars is one of my Guilty Pleasures. I have no idea why I’m so entertained by Dave, Darrell, Brandi & Jerrod, and Barry bidding on other people’s abandoned property. But apparently plenty of other people share the same fascination I have with the drama because Storage Wars is the highest rated program on A&E. Tonight our intrepid entrepreneurs will be bidding on abandoned storage lockers and finding trash and treasure. Check your local listings for the broadcast time in your area.
Several radio stations in our area started playing Christmas music the day after Halloween. That’s too soon for me. I prefer listening to Christmas music after Thanksgiving. Each year, Diane and I buy one or two new Christmas music CDs (we have about 50 in our CD collection). This year, it was Katherine Jenkins’ This is Christmas. I’ve been a fan of Katherine Jenkins for years. She gained a whole new audience with her appearances on Dancing With the Stars. If you’re looking for a delightful Christmas CD, I recommend this one. Take a listen below:
This game didn’t sell out–in fact the die-hard fans who attend will be sitting in the rain–so radio coverage will be the order of the day. The Bills haven’t been mathematically eliminated, but their chances of making the Playoffs are very, very slim. Bills fans already talk about the 2013 NFL Draft. Is your favorite NFL team still in contention? 
Diane is a big fan of NPR’s “Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me” and one of her favorite panelists is Paula Poundstone. When Diane heard that Paula Poundstone was appearing at her alma mater, Buffalo State College, to perform her stand-up comedy routine, she bought tickets. And, sure enough, Paula was as funny in-person as she is on the radio. Although part of her 2-hour show had some set routines, much of her comedy was generated by interaction with the audience. The set routines included bits about Paula’s three adopted children, Elvis, classic TV shows, and her own obsessive-compulsive tendencies. Paula engaged the audience which resulted in plenty of laughs about the lighting of the Peace Bridge (the main bridge to Canada), manipulative teachers and managers, and hooking up in the Beer Tent at a local festival. If Paula Poundstone shows up in your area, and you want to laugh, I’d recommend you attend her performance.
George V. Higgins wrote two classic crime novels: The Friends of Eddie Coyle and Cogan’s Trade, now retitled Killing Them Softly to tie-in with the new Brad Pitt movie of the same name. Higgins went on to write many other fine crime novels, but few of them reached the intensity of these two books. Jackie Cogan is an enforcer for organized crime in the Boston area. When a high-stakes card game is knocked-over, Cogan is called in to “fix” the problem. For those of you who haven’t experienced Higgins’ writing style, it’s gritty and hard-boiled. The movie opens today. Check out the trailer below.
It’s hard to believe The Rolling Stones have been around for 50 years. Harder still to admit I’ve been listening to their music for much of that time. The Stones did their best work between 1962 and 1982. After that, the quality of their work slipped to mediocre levels punctuated with occasion hits (like “Harlem Shuffle” in 1984). The Stones have issued Greatest Hits compilations in the past but this 3-CD remastered set sounds best. Not everything is here (I would have included “The Hand of Fate”) but most of it is. You can hear Keith Richards’ story of how “Street-Fighting Man” was made by clicking 
Our discussion on Monday about the decline of education in America sent me to this volume from 1962. Back in the Fifties and Sixties, many colleges and universities had a curriculum based on Great Books. The University of Chicago and Columbia University were chief proponents of this approach to learning. Students were presented with the Great Books of Western Civilization and expected to master their wisdom. The Proper Study: Essays on Western Classics was designed as a guide book to the great works. It was illuminating to see what was considered “a classic” back in 1962:
I finally caught up with The Ides of March, a slick political thriller. Ryan Gosling plays a smart political operative working on George Clooney’s Presidential campaign. Gosling discovers a secret that could change the whole political race. I enjoyed the suspense in this film and the talented cast: Gosling, Clooney, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, Marisa Tomei, and Evan Rachel Wood. Check out the trailer below. GRADE: A-