Best Recipe: Black-Eyed Peas and Rice

Homely but delicious: The best black-eyed peas in a one-pot dinner

Cook’s notes: Dried black-eyed peas do not need to be soaked overnight. This recipe is very efficient: everything cooks in one pot, and the protein of the beans is balanced with rice. Serve warm with sweet pickle relish (preferably one without high fructose corn syrup, such as Wickles brand from Alabama). Make it a vegetarian dish: instead of chicken broth, use either 4 cups vegetable broth or 4 cups water plus 3 vegetable bouillon cubes.

Servings:  6 (makes 6 cups)
Total Time: 1 hour

1 cup dried black-eyed peas, rinsed and drained
4 cups low-sodium chicken broth (fat free is OK, too)
2 tsp jarred minced garlic (equivalent to 4 cloves, crushed)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 red onion, chopped
1 cup rice, long-grain, uncooked

1 Combine peas and broth in large Dutch oven on the stovetop. Add garlic and stir. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat. Stir in oil, salt, and pepper. Cover. Simmer 15 minutes.

2 Stir in onion. Cover. Simmer 15 to 20 minutes or until peas are almost soft.

3 Stir in rice. Cover. Simmer 15 to 20 minutes more until rice is fluffy, broth is nearly fully absorbed, and the peas are tender. Remove from heat. Let stand, covered, 10 minutes before serving with sweet pickle relish.

Adapted from http://www.food.com/recipe/vegetarian-black-eyed-peas-rice-387502

Easy Balsamic Black Beans

Cook’s notes: Easy side dish. Excellent when mixed with rice and vegetables.

15 oz can black beans, rinsed and drained (you can also use white beans)
3 Tbsp Balsamic Vinaigrette (link)

Add vinaigrette to the black beans. Stir well and taste to see if it needs more salt or vinegar. Cover tightly and refrigerate until serving time. Optional: Add a handful of shredded carrots for color. Beans keep well for about 5 days stored air-tight in refrigerator.

Variation — Warm Balsamic black beans:
Rinse and drain 1 can (15 oz) black beans. Heat in a pan with 1/4 tsp olive oil, 1/2 tsp ground cumin, and 1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar. Stir the beans, and as they warm through, mash them with the back of the spoon. When all the beans are mashed, add water as needed to keep the consistency smooth.

Adapted from Katzen, Mollie and Walter Willett. Eat, drink, and weigh less. New York: Hyperion, 2006.

Best Recipe: Curry Wild Rice Salad

Cook’s notes: You can easily halve this recipe. Leftovers freeze well. This dish is very popular at potlucks. As the friend who gave me this recipe told me, be sure to bring a copy of this recipe with you, because people will ask for it. The original recipe called for 1.5 cup dressing: 6 oz olive oil, 3 oz honey, and 3 oz vinegar. This made a little too much dressing. You could also use equal parts olive oil, honey, and vinegar: 1/3 cup each.

Rice Salad:
2 (6 oz) pkg long grain and wild rice (such as the Near East or Uncle Ben’s brands)
1 cup golden raisins or currants
4 oz (1/2 c) dried cherries
1/2 bunch scallions, chopped
1 yellow and 1 red pepper, seeded and diced (or 1/2 pkg Trader Joe’s frozen bell pepper mix, thawed)
1 cup tiny peas, thawed
1 cup salted cashews

Dressing:
1/2 cup (4 oz) olive oil
1/4 cup (2 oz) honey
1/4 cup (2 oz) apple cider vinegar
1 Tbsp mild curry powder

Cook wild rice mix according to package directions but omit the spice packet. This makes about 6 cup of cooked rice. If using raw peppers, sauté them briefly to soften them. Toss the hot, cooked rice with the other ingredients (raisins to cashews). Blend the dressing well, and pour over rice mixture. Serve warm or room temperature.

Black Beans and Kielbasa

Cook’s notes: Comfort food in 40 minutes, including prep time. You can even double the spinach.

1 pkg turkey kielbasa (14 to 16 oz), cut into 1/4-inch slices
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 large shallot, diced
Salt and ground black pepper
1 tsp minced garlic
2 cans (15 oz) black beans, rinsed and drained
1 can (16 oz) fat-free chicken broth
1 package baby spinach (6 oz)
For serving: plain, fat-free yogurt

In a large skillet, heat oil over medium-high. Add kielbasa and cook until browned on all sides, about 8 minutes. Transfer to a plate. Add shallots to skillet and cook until beginning to soften, about 4 minutes; season with salt and pepper. Add garlic and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add black beans and broth and bring mixture to a boil. Add sausage, reduce heat to a rapid simmer, and top with spinach. Cover the pan and cook until the spinach wilts. Remove from heat and serve with a dollop of yogurt.

Adapted from Everyday Food, November 2010

Baked Chicken and Deluxe Black Bean Salad

Cook’s Notes: Two excellent dishes combine for a summer night supper that’s “loaded with vegetables”. The next day, make a meal salad for lunch: dice the leftover chicken and toss it with a scoop of the bean salad. Serve over baby spinach leaves with extra dressing as needed.

Honey-Dijon Chicken (link): A bit of a misnomer, since the main components of the sauce are honey, lemon juice, and soy sauce. There is just a touch of mustard in this marinade — and no oil at all, which means the chicken isn’t greasy. Basting the boneless skinless chicken breasts every 15 minutes keeps them from getting dry. The ingredients are nicely balanced. Will definitely make it again — this recipe replaces several other baked chicken recipes I had that weren’t quite right.

• Tip: Microwave the honey for 30 seconds to loosen it. The warm honey then blends easily with the rest of the sauce ingredients.

Deluxe Black Bean Salad (link): I modified a great base recipe from Diana Rattray, the About.com Guide to Southern Food. A pasta salad becomes an excellent vegetable and bean salad. In fact, this salad just tastes like summer, and it has some of my favorite vegetables: red bell pepper, sweet onion, cucumber, fresh corn, and black beans. The chili-lime vinaigrette dressing is a knockout. Modifications and notes:

• Omit the macaroni pasta and the mayonnaise
• Use Vidalia sweet onion instead of red onion
• Use 1 peeled English hot-house cucumber, diced, instead of just 1/2 cup diced cucumber
• Steam 3 ears of fresh corn in the microwave for 6 minutes; strip kernels off the cob
• Use 2 tsp dried cilantro instead of 2 Tbsp fresh
• Reduce chili powder to 3/4 tsp
• Increase cumin powder to 3/4 tsp
• Use 1/2 tsp kosher salt instead of regular table salt

Menu: Southwest Dinner with Corn Muffins

Cook’s notes: This vegetarian dinner is easy to assemble and absolutely delicious. The colors on the plate are beautiful together. You may even be too full for dessert!

• Double corn muffins
• Balsamic black beans: Rinse and drain 1 can (15 oz) black beans. Heat in a pan with 1/4 tsp olive oil, 1/2 tsp ground cumin, and 1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar. Stir the beans, and as they warm through, mash them with the back of the spoon. When all the beans are mashed, add water as needed to keep the consistency smooth.
• Fajita vegetables: sauté sliced sweet onions, sliced mushrooms, and diced red bell peppers with a packet of fajita seasoning. The seasoning packet was mixed with water to make a marinade/sauce for the vegetables.
• Baby spinach steamed with minced garlic and lemon juice
• Diced avocado
• Optional bean toppings: fresh salsa and sour cream
• Dessert: Slices of fresh pineapple and mandarin orange sorbet

Serving suggestion: Use a shallow bowl for serving. Break a few mini corn muffins onto the bowl. Ladle the fajita vegetables over the muffins. Spoon beans and spinach next to the vegetables. Top the black beans with diced avocado.

Breakfast from the leftovers: The next day, use any leftover fajita vegetables in scrambled eggs with cheese. Heat up remaining corn muffins to eat with the eggs. Serve bowls of Greek yogurt with blueberries, the sliced pineapple, a drizzle of honey, and a handful of toasted almonds.

Tried and Liked: Chicken with Apple Rice Pilaf

Cook’s Notes: This main dish from Recipezaar (link) required very few changes. We used 2 packages of frozen Rice Expressions Pilaf, which yielded 4 cups of cooked rice, and 1 Tbsp soy sauce instead of 2 Tbsp Worchestershire sauce. I cut the chicken into strips, and we cored the apple.

Deluxe Couscous with Clementines

Cook’s Notes: I’ve been working to learn new gluten-free, vegan dishes for entertaining friends. This deluxe rice dish is absolutely delicious. We served it with roasted chicken and grilled zucchini. Makes 12 servings; you could easily halve the recipe and use 3 clementines. This deluxe couscous could stand on its own as a vegetarian main dish with a mixed green salad.

2 (7-oz) package plain Brown Rice Couscous (link)

5 seedless clementines
15-ounce can chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup water
18 almond-stuffed green olives, halved
1/2 cup seedless Thompson raisins

Prepare the brown rice couscous according to package directions. It takes 15 minutes to cook.

Peel and section the clementines; discard peel.

Bring chickpeas with water to boil in saucepan. Reduce heat to medium. Add clementine sections, olives, and raisins.  Simmer until mixture is heated through, about 3 minutes.

Gently fluff couscous with fork. Add chickpea mixture. Stir to incorporate evenly. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Adapted from a recipe in Bon Appétit | December 2009, recipe by Lora Zarubin (link)

Vegan-Plus Dinner Menus

Cook’s Notes: We have several friends who are “vegan-plus” due to food allergies and restrictions: Vegan plus gluten-free or vegan plus soy-free. I wanted to plan some vegetarian dinners that could accommodate all diners happily without including meat, dairy, wheat, rye, barley, oats, soy beans, tofu, or fake soy meats. The purpose of this post is to record some ideas I’ve found.

See also: A list of safe gluten-free foods (link)

Easy way out: Order food from Tucson Tamale Company. All of their items are gluten-free. They make their amazing tamales without lard, and they have at least two to three vegan options at all times. Since the tamales are individually wrapped, there’s no worries about the pork tamale touching the cheese tamale for guests.

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Basic meal plan template: A rice, corn, or potato dish; a bean dish for protein; one to two vegetables; and dessert (such as fruit or sorbet). Peanut butter cookies can be made gluten-free and eggless for dessert as well (link; use vegan chocolate chips).

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Menu 1:
Wild rice with pine nuts and raisins
Warm Italian Cherry Tomatoes
Sautéed spinach and white beans (link)
Butternut squash soup (purchased)

Menu 2:
Black bean-smothered sweet potatoes with tomatoes (link, omit sour cream or serve on the side)
Mixed green salad

Menu 3:
Red Beans and Rice Bowl (omit cheese or serve on the side)
This meal includes spinach and mushrooms. For dessert, serve fresh pineapple.

Menu 4:
Brown rice “couscous” (from Lundberg Family Farms) with onion and chickpeas
Oven-roasted yellow squash, carrots, zucchini, and scallions
Mixed green salad

Menu 5:
Hot version of “Monster Salad” with green beans, red pepper, potato, and chickpeas (link)
Serve with rice and fresh fruit

Italian Night:
Gluten-free pasta with red sauce and white beans
Steamed broccoli or sautéed zucchini
Oven-roasted carrots
Mixed green salad

Italian Night II:
Baked spaghetti squash with tomato sauce
Garlic bean soup (link)
Baby spinach salad

Mexican Night:
Guacamole, salsa, and corn tortilla chips
Mushroom fajitas (link) with corn tortillas
Black and White Beans

Baked Beans, Two Ways

Cook’s Notes: I have two favorite ways to make baked beans. I’ve used the barbecue baked beans recipe for at least 15 years. The stovetop method is new to me as of 2009, but I love it, too. Each recipe serves about 6 people.

Barbecue Baked Beans

1/2 cup onion, chopped
1/4 cup red bell pepper, chopped
1/2 cup ketchup
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup barbecue sauce
1 tsp mustard
31 oz can vegetarian baked beans, partially drained

Heat oven to 350°F.

In a skillet coated with cooking spray, sauté the onions and bell pepper until wilted. In large bowl, combine ketchup, brown sugar, Worcestershire, barbecue seasoning, and mustard. Skim liquid from top of beans while still in can. Combine beans, onion, peppers, and other ingredients. Put into a greased, 2-quart casserole. Bake 30 to 45 minutes.

Source: Adapted from a recipe found on www.dianaskitchen.com in the mid-1990′s

Stovetop Baked Beans

Sauce:
1/4 cup ketchup
1/4 cup molasses
3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
1.5 teaspoons yellow mustard
1/2 cup water

Add-ins and Beans:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
15-ounce can pinto beans, rinsed and drained
15-ounce can white kidney beans, rinsed and drained
Combine the sauce ingredients in a medium bowl.

Make the Add-ins: Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally, about 8 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-low; add beans and the sauce mixture to the pan. Gently stir to combine, cover and cook until heated through, about 3 minutes.

Make this a main dish: Sauté 6 ounces baby spinach and 12 ounces chicken sausage links (about 4 links), sliced into coins. Cook well until spinach wilts and sausage is heated through. Add greens and sausage to the dish.

Source: Adapted from Eating Well magazine and The Wednesday Chef