Vegetarian Red Beans & Rice

I’m not sure what prompted it but last week my wife said she wanted Red Beans & Rice. We’ve only eaten it a couple of times in 15 years so it was a pretty obscure request. No worries though, it sounds good and I can definitely pull that off.

I went looking for recipes to get some inspiration and quickly found a great vegetarian (eating lighter these days) red beans & recipe from the Sortachef blog. I adapted the recipe in three ways. I used chipotle and chili powder instead of straight up cayenne. Margot seems to be more sensitive to cayenne and I wanted her to be able to eat the dish at will. I added 1 tsp of liquid smoke to help offset the missing flavors that you would get in the traditional dish from sausage and/or other meats. I then added the juice of ½ of a lime. I am finding that a slight hit of acid in some dishes helps flavors express themselves.

Vegetarian Red Beans & Rice

2 cups dry Small Red Beans, soaked overnight
1 large yellow onion, chopped
4 sticks celery with leaves, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
4 Tbsp olive oil
6 cups water
3 teaspoons of salt (reserve 1 tsp)
½ tsp of freshly ground black pepper
1 ½ tsp of dry thyme
1 ½ tsp of oregano
½ tsp chipotle powder
½ tsp chili powder
1 tsp liquid smoke
Juice of ½ a lime
3 cloves garlic, pressed or finely chopped
8 ounces of tomato sauce
Cooked rice

Soak the beans overnight covered by 2 inches of water. Drain, rinse and pick out any stones, stems or rotted beans.

Heat the 4 Tbsp oil in a large dutch oven. Sauté the onion, celery and green pepper over medium-high, turning occasionally with a spatula. When the pepper has lightened in color and the onions are translucent remove the vegetables from the heat and drain off the excess oil. Wipe out the dutch oven and return the vegetables to it.

Add the beans and 6 cups of cold water to the sautéed veggies. Now add the salt (2 tsp), black pepper, oregano, thyme, chipotle, chili powder, liquid smoke, lime juice and garlic. Mix well.

Bake in the oven at 325°. Put bean pot on the center rack and bake for 2 ½ hours covered, stirring every half hour or so. After 2 ½ hours, add the tomato sauce and last 1 tsp of salt. Remove the lid from the bean pot. Increase the heat to 375° and cook for 2-3 hours, until beans are tender and the cooking liquid has thickened.

( All done and ready to eat! )

Make a pile of cooked rice. Place 2/3 to 1 cup of the red beans mixture on top of the rice. Enjoy with hot sauce if you like some heat!

( Slightly out of focus. Sorry. It was good nonetheless! )

We enjoyed this hearty, but lighter than the classic, dish with a homemade Belgian White beer and the newest episode of the FX cartoon series Archer. The beer has coriander and bitter orange peel in it. Those flavors together with the creamy wheat body of the beer really worked well with the beans and rice. The pairing with Archer is a different sort of pairing all together. Off-color jokes and sexual innuendo are always good for a laugh and made for great atmosphere to enjoy dinner and a beer to on a Friday night.

Cheers!

Jason

Provencal Beef Stew

( That will get ya thinking! )

We didn’t have any beef dishes while we were in France so when I was home for a week or so and yearning for the aromas and flavors from the trip, I went searching for a good recipe. I found a whole bunch of different recipes for Provencal style beef stews and as I often do I picked different aspects from several to pull together something new.

Provencal Beef Stew over Steamed Vegetables

2 1/2 lbs of stew beef
1/3 cup flour
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
4 tsp olive oil
1 cup chopped onion
2 large cloves garlic, minced
1 cup dry red wine (Cotes du Rhone is perfect)
3 cups low-sodium beef broth
1 pound of diced tomatoes (frozen fresh from last summer), undrained
1 Tbsp. Herbes de Provence
1 lb potatoes, cut into ¾ inch cubes
4 large carrots, sliced
2 Tbsp corn starch
2 oz water
1/2 cup niçoise olives, pitted and cut in half
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
1 large zucchini, cut into 1/2-inch thick slices
1 large yellow squash, cut into 1/2-inch thick slices
12 oz green beans, cleaned and trimmed

1. Combine flour, salt and pepper. Reserve 1 tablespoon flour mixture. Lightly coat beef with remaining flour mixture.

2. Heat 2 teaspoons oil in stockpot over medium heat until hot. Brown 1/2 of beef; remove from stockpot. Repeat with remaining 2 teaspoons oil and remaining beef. Place beef in a slow cooker that had been sprayed with cooking spray. Set the slow cooker on high.

3. Add onion and garlic to stockpot; cook and stir 3 to 5 minutes or until onions are tender. Add wine; increase heat to medium-high. Cook and stir 1 to 2 minutes or until browned bits attached to stockpot are dissolved. Pour this mixture into the slow cooker. Stir in broth, tomatoes, Herbes de Provence and remaining flour mixture. Add the potatoes and carrots. Cook on high for 1 hour, reduce heat to low and cook for 6 hours.

4. Mix the corn starch into the water. Add to the stew. Add the olives and basil and mix the stew well; cook on high for another 30 minutes until the olives are heated through and the stew has thickened.

6. Steam the green beans, zucchini and yellow squash until tender.

7. Serve the stew over the steamed vegetables with crusty bread and the remainder of the wine used to make the strew.

( Fair herbs, you will soon be making me happy! )

The aromas in the house while the slow cooker did its thing were amazing. The Herbes de Provence blend you might find in the store will vary in the ingredients, including savory, rosemary, thyme, basil and lavender. I often have all of these on hand and will definitely experiment with different combinations in future Provencal dishes.

The wine I selected to use in this dish and then enjoy with it was the La Vielle Ferme Cotes du Ventoux Rouge. As I noted in my post on the wines we enjoyed while in Provence (I had this wine on the Air France plane flight over), this wine has a wonderful nose and for the value price it is a great wine to have on hand.

( The final cut! It was so good. )

When paired with the stew and crusty bread the wine performed exceptionally. The influences of the garlic, onions and herbs flavored the beef wonderfully and the wine’s combination of fruit and earth added complexity to each bite. The steamed vegetables were cooked separately so with a bit of the stew sauce they retained a good deal of own flavors, which when paired with the wine was a lighter and fresher pairing.

Cheers!

Jason