White Beans with Rosemary, Tomato Candy, & Roasted Garlic {A 5:2 Diet Dinner}

I generally cannot stand the idea of diets. There's always something you're supposed to cut out forever and ever. Going Paleo? Buh-bye pasta and grains. Doing the Eat to Live thing? No more steak or cheese for you, and I hope you really - and  I mean really  - love beans.

Sorry, dieters, but a life without cheesy pizza and the occasional burger and fries is not what I would consider truly living.

However. One of my many freelance jobs is recipe development. Sometimes these recipes are incredibly fattening, like the feature I am working on right now involving not one but five baked pasta and cheese dishes. Given that I am no Olympic athlete and I don't believe in wasting food, there is no way I could ever do enough exercise to burn off all those carbs without breaking something.

Beans & Cornbread (had a fight ... but don't you worry, it worked out allright!)

Beans and Cornbread had a fight
Beans knocked Cornbread outta sight
Cornbread said,  "Now that’s alright, meet me on the corner tomorrow night"
I'll be ready, I'll be ready tomorrow night
I'll be ready, I'll be ready tomorrow night
I'll be ready, I'll be ready tomorrow night 

 --Louis Jordan, "Beans 'n Cornbread" 

In the famous Louis Jordan song I quote above, beans and cornbread start out fighting, but by the end of the song, they become best of friends and realize that they go together like "hot cakes and molasses," "strawberries and shortcake," and "sour cream and biscuits." Silly beans and cornbread! I knew it all along.