Meet pizza salad, a family-friendly plate of tomatoes, mozzarella and marinated beans

If you're a fan of the convenience and versatility of canned beans but you've thought they could use a flavor boost, I've got two words for you: Marinate them.

Beans can soak up the flavors in a simple combination of vinegar, olive oil, garlic, basil and red-pepper flakes - and they can do it even more quickly with the application of a little heat. The following use of this idea comes from Jenny Rosenstrach's new book, "The Weekday Vegetarians" (Clarkson Potter, 2021), which is full of her ideas for eating meatless five days a week and then being free for carnivorous splurges on two. Rosenstrach calls for marinating the beans in the refrigerator for as little as 15 minutes and as long as five days. She doesn't call for warming, but I knew - and verified in testing - that it jump-starts the whole affair so effectively it's worth incorporating into the method. Marinated beans have all sorts of uses, from simple side dish to grain-bowl topping, but Rosenstrach tosses them into what she calls "pizza salad." The brilliant thing about it is that the beans' marinade becomes the salad dressing; unlike with meat marinades, there's no need to worry about any food-safety issues in the reusing.