I haven’t had 3 bean salad since I was a kid.  I liked the tangy flavor.  But I really dislike wax beans, which is pretty much always one of the three beans in commercially canned Three Bean Salads.  I was looking into recipes for home canning 3 bean salad, when I came across this recipe at Food Storage Moms.  This is not a canning recipe, and I am not a canning expert to know if its even safe to can, but I thought maybe this is a smart thing to do anyway.  I don’t know if my family will eat canned bean salad at all.  They like beans, but the kids are a but sensitive to vinegary dressings.  What if I canned a bunch of jars and if Mom and I were the only ones that would eat it?  This recipe seemed like a smart way to make a small batch to test the waters, and hooray, no wax beans in sight!

I’ve got all the ingredients on hand, including some interesting celery from my latest CSA that is weird and thin and would be best used in a fine dice so I am definitely making a batch, as soon as I hit post. =)

This recipe is copied directly from Food Storage Moms (I am not sure why salt is listed twice in the brining liquid. I did post a comment and ask, but the original was posted over a year ago, so I don’t know that I will get a response. She did respond and just removed it.)

1 can garbanzo beans, drained
1 can kidney beans, drained
1 can green beans, drained
1 can red beans, drained
1 can navy beans, drained
1 small onion, chopped/diced
1 small green bell pepper, chopped/diced
½ cup chopped/diced celery

Grab a quart mason jar and fill and shake the following ingredients

¾ cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
½ cup oil
½ cup vinegar (I prefer white vinegar)
½ teaspoon pepper
½ teaspoon paprika

Mix all ingredients in the jar that will fit. Keep in the refrigerator and serve well chilled. I always have excess beans that I add to the vinegar solution the next day to get one more meal out of it.