Yippie!! Dried black beans to ready in 90 minutes--no pre-soaking!

Myths Shattered:

Adding salt before cooking toughens the skin (it doesn't)

Beans need to soak before being cooked (no they don't!)

I love black beans.  I just don't love trying to talk my blonde-brain into remembering to start the soak the night before, rinse and drain in the morning, then crock-pot cook them all day long!

Googled it, and found some clear instructions here, modified it a bit (I need to rinse dried, bagged stuff before cooking.  It's a thing I have), crossed my fingers and Ta-Dah!  It worked beautifully!

Here's the how-to:

1. Rinse beans (I did 3 cups of the dried)
2. Pre-heat oven to 250 degrees
3. Put beans in a medium to large oven-proof pot and add water till 1.5-2 inches over beans.
4. Add 1.5+/- tsp salt and any other spices you like.  I used 1 tsp cumin.
5. Cover and bring to full boil on stove-top.
6. Once beans have reached a boil, put the pot (still covered) into the oven.
7. Bake for 75-85 minutes, checking at the 40 minute mark to make sure there's enough water.  If they look a little dry, add some water.  You can either add boiling water and put the pot right back in the oven, or you can add cold water and bring it back to a boil on the stovetop first, then replace in the oven.

As Fat-Guy says (yeah, that's what his screen-name says--I'm not calling hime names), "Go forth and soak no more!"

Enjoy!