Black Bean Fiesta Salad

You know those recipes that you can use to make a pot-luck dish, and you leave the pot-luck with everyone thinking that you're some sort of magical culinary genius? This is one of those recipes. Its frugal, its vegetarian, its delicious; and people now ask me to please bring that salad to pot-lucks.

Do you want to know something funny?  I got this recipe during my first semester of grad school. I was in a communications class that met from 6-9pm every Wednesday, and towards the end of the semester, the prof asked us to plan on coming early and staying late one night so that we could finish our final presentations of the semester. I don't remember what I brought {(mushroom and rice casserole?)}, but Cheryl brought this. Yes, I got the pot-luck magic recipe from a pot-luck. So, what better way to acknowledge that than to share it in an online recipe swap. Linking up to This Weeks Cravings!

 Ingredients

1 can black beans, rinsed and drained, or equivalent of slow-cooked dried black beans

1 cup frozen corn, thawed

1 green pepper, diced

1 red pepper, diced

1 cup diced red onion {(this usually works out to about half)}

1 cup celery, diced {(usually 2-3 stalks)}

1 brick pepper jack cheese with jalapeno {(anyone know how to make the tilde on a mac?)} cut into itty bitty cubes

3 tablespoons lemon juice

3 tablespoons red wine vinegar

2 tablespoons olive oil

3 garlic cloves, minced {(extra fine)}

1 tablespoon Italian seasoning

1 teaspoon pepper

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

Directions:

IN large bowl combine beans, corn, peppers, onion, celery and cheese.   

In a separate bowl/container {(I use my measuring cup)}, combine the remaining ingredients

Pour over vegetable mixture and toss gently.  

Cover and chill for 2 hours or overnight.

Enjoy!

P.S. Sorry for the super pixelated photos. My camera's battery died right as I was trying to snap the picture, and well, my phone is not so technologically advanced.