Black Bean and Corn Salad

One day, I found myself blessed with about 12 ears of fresh, farmer's market corn. I wanted to try something different that would not heat up my kitchen (at the time, the temperature was hovering around 100 degrees), so I decided upon a black bean and corn salad.

I adapted this from many different recipes that I looked at, including one by Rachael Ray of "30 Minute Meals" fame. All measurements are approximate - tweak the recipe to suit your tastes.

You can use dried black beans that you cook yourself, but as I said above, my goal was to keep my kitchen as cool as possible, so I used canned.

Black Bean and Fresh Corn Salad

4 cups fresh corn, cooked and sliced off the cob (about 8 ears)

2 cups black beans, rinsed and drained (if canned)

1 small red bell pepper, finely diced

1 small red onion, finely diced, or sliced into rings

Tabasco, to taste. (I used about 8 shakes of the bottle, but then I don't like heat.)

salt and pepper, to taste

1 tablespoon ground cumin

3-4 tablespoons fresh lime juice

1/4 cups olive oil

3 T cilantro, finely chopped. (I love cilantro, but you can add more or leave this out.)

Whisk salt, pepper, Tabasco, and cumin into the lime juice. Stream in the olive oil, whisking all the time.

Mix together the beans, corn, bell pepper, and onion. Add the lime juice dressing. Mix in the cilantro before serving.

Gets better if you let it set a spell.

This makes a lot of salad, plenty for 6-8 people.