Cool article from a recent latimes.com edition featuring Steve Sando of Rancho Gordo. Rancho Gordo is out of Napa, California and sells a variety of legumes and chile peppers that they grow there, plus a number of delectable-looking sauces, chile powders, and other stuff as well. Steve sounds like a guy we would enjoy hanging out with, so check this out:

latimes.com Daily Dish blog

My Rancho Gordo care package

Some weeks ago, during the course of writing a cooking story on beans and greens, I had the happy privilege of a few telephone conversations with Rancho Gordo founder Steve Sando. Rancho Gordo is the Napa company that markets a terrific assortment of dried heirloom beans, which Sando sources himself during treks through the Americas. (The humble bean has gone chic: Rancho Gordo was #2 in this year’s Saveur Magazine 100; the company’s biggest customer is the California headquarters of Google.) Sando — empassioned, funny, articulate — told me about his clay pot experiments; his firm belief that really good beans don’t need anything more than water and mirepoix to bring out their true flavors (i.e. no ham hocks, no stock); and that he’s been busy translating his hills of beans into a book, due out in September.

Sando was also the inspiration for the Christmas lima bean taco recipe that I’ve been making obsessively since. Finally, I got online and ordered packages of Good Mother Stallard, Goat’s Eye and Black Calypso beans; a bottle of pure Mexican vanilla extract; and Rancho Gordo’s Gay Caballero very hot sauce.

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