Black Beans with Leek over Cauliflower Puree

Cauliflower puree

1 head of cauliflower, "floretted" and the florets chopped
2 potatoes - russet or yukon gold or something similar (ie not a waxy potato), diced
1/4 cup olive oil (approx)
1/2 cup milk or soy milk (approx)
1 cloves garlic minced very finely
salt (to taste)
fresh ground pepper (to taste - I used a little over 1 tsp)

Steam the cauliflower and the potato until quite soft - the cauliflower was softer than I would eat it, were I not planning on purreeing - but I like firm vegetables. Once steamed, drain the water out of the pot and put the cauliflower and potato back in the pot. Start to break it up with a hand mixer. Add olive oil, milk, salt, garlic and pepper and then mix some more until it is smooth. At this point I turned the burner back on and let it cook some more.

Black Beans with leek

Half of the white bit of a large leek (take one large leek, chop off the green end - save that bit for stock - and the root end and use half of that. Or the whole thing, depends on how much you like leeks)
1 can of black beans - or equivalent of soaked, dried beans*
3 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped
salt
fresh ground pepper

Heat up some oil in a pan. Once it is hot, add the leeks and saute them until they soften. Add the can of beans. Add chopped garlic, salt and pepper and leave to cook in its liquid, while you puree your cauliflower - you may need to add water as the liquid reduces.

Spoon the puree onto a plate and serve the beans on top.

*I've been really doing a good job about presoaking dried beans recently and I find the flavour difference that much more worth it. It's also a better idea as far as environmental impact goes, despite what Nina Shen Rastogi would have you believe - she wrote an article for slate about canned vs dried and forgot to take into consideration the energy required for making the cans and then recycling them or that it is much easier to buy bulk dried beans than bulk canned beans - meaning much less packaging. However, we do have cans of beans on hand, because sometimes you need something quick and filling and nothing does that like a can of beans, heated up, with salt and pepper, lots butter or olive oil, with maybe a teaspoon of vegetable stock if it's handy or whatever else you want to flavour it with (curry, cayenne, oregano, basil, beer...etc).